The   Strategy   of 

The   Great   War 

A  Study  of  its  Campaigns  and  Battles  in  their 

Relation  to  Allied  and  German 

Military  Policy 


By 

William  L.  McPherson 

Author  of  "  A  Short  History  of  the  Great  War" 


G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  and  London 

Zbe    Iknickerbocfccr.    press 

1919 


Copyright,  1919 

BY 

WILLIAM   L.   McPHERSON 


Ube  "fcnfCRerbocher  J>rc88,  1Rew  !>orh 


Go 

MY  WIFE 


PREFACE 

The  first  six  chapters  of  this  volume  appeared  in  the 
Sunday  issues  of  the  New  York  Tribune  in  January  and 
February,  19 19.  Parts  of  four  other  chapters  appeared 
in  later  Sunday  issues  of  the  same  newspaper.  The 
author's  thanks  are  due  to  Mr.  Ogden  Reid,  editor-in- 
chief  of  the  Tribune,  for  permission  to  reprint  them  in 
book  form. 

In  these  studies  the  author  has  elaborated  the  theo- 
ries outlined  in  his  daily  ' '  Military  Comment ' '  in  the 
Tribune  from  April  15,  1918,  until  the  signing  of  the 
armistice. 

This  war  differed  from  all  other  wars.  It  was  fought 
on  a  scale  transcending  all  experience.  Its  develop- 
ment could  not  be  foreseen  by  the  general  staffs  which 
were  charged  with  conducting  it.  Many  new  and 
disturbing  factors  entered  into  it.  The  strategy  on 
both  sides  was  confused  and  empirical.  Novel  condi- 
tions in  the  field  also  revolutionized  tactics.  The  old 
balance  between  the  offensive  and  the  defensive  was 


vi  Preface 

deranged.  It  had  to  travel  slowly  around  a  circle  to 
re-establish  itself.  The  war,  by  its  very  immensity, 
overrode  the  strategists.  It  worked  out  its  own 
strategy  and  its  own  tactics. 

It  is  the  purpose  of  this  volume  to  interpret  the 
influences  which  controlled  the  military  policy  of  the 
two  belligerent  groups,  and  to  present  a  clear  view  of 
the  curious  evolution  of  tactics  which  led  from  open 
warfare  through  the  deadlock  of  rigid  positional  fight- 
ing around  again  to  semi-open  and  then  to  practically 
open  warfare.  To  the  military  student  this  phase  is 
of  absorbing  interest. 

What  may  be  called  the  grand  strategy  of  the  war 
was  largely  affected  by  political  as  well  as  by  purely 
military  considerations.  Germany's  fatal  blunder — 
that  of  forcing  the  United  States  into  the  contest- — is 
traceable  to  political  misjudgments  of  long  standing. 
Politics,  diplomacy,  strategy,  and  the  moral  deficiencies 
of  the  German  character  all  had  their  roles  in  the  gi- 
gantic drama  entitled  "World  Power  or  Downfall." 
Taking  these  all  into  account  it  is  the  writer's  object  to 
show,  in  a  simple  and  non-technical  way,  why  Germany 
lost  a  war  which  she  might  have  won  if  she  had  con- 
ducted it  with  a  keener  sense  of  her  own  geographical 
and  military  limitations. 

The  first  six  chapters  deal  with  the  general  principles 


Preface 


Vll 


underlying  German  and  Allied  strategy.  The  others 
analyze  the  battles  and  campaigns  in  which  the  working 
out  of  these  principles  is  illustrated. 

The  details  of  most  of  the  main  operations  of  the  war 
have  yet  to  be  filled  in.  There  are  few  critical  works 
available.  Perhaps  the  most  satisfactory  books  of  this 
sort  produced  up  to  date  are  volumes  ii  and  iii  of  General 
Palat's  La  Grande  Guerre  sur  le  Front  Occidental — stud- 
ies of  Joffre's  Alsace,  Lorraine,  and  Belgian  offensives 
of  1914. 

For  the  German  interpretation  of  German  strategy 
Lieutenant-General  Baron  Freytag-Loringhoven,  Deputy 
Chief  of  the  German  General  Staff,  is  the  most  useful 
source.  He  has  been  drawn  on  freely  in  this  volume 
because  when  he  wrote  his  two  books — Deductions 
from  the  World  War  and  A  Nation  Trained  in  Arms  or 
a  Militia  ? — he  thought  that  Germany  was  going  to 
win,  and  was  willing  to  speak  somewhat  frankly  and 
indulgently  of  the  causes  which,  in  his  opinion,  had 
retarded  victory.  The  elaborate  series  of  descriptions 
of  battles  and  campaigns  issued  under  the  patronage 
of  the  German  General  Staff — Kriegsberichte  aus  dem 
Grossen  Hauptquartier— shows  only  here  and  there  a 
glimmer  of  critical  frankness. 

General  Basil  Gourko's  book,  War  and  Revolution 
in  Russia,  is  an  excellent  first-hand  authority  on  the 


Vlll 


Preface 


conditions  on  the  Russian  front.  It  is  candid  and 
discriminating.  Ambassador  Morgenthau1  s  Story  con- 
tains valuable  first-hand  information  about  the  Darden- 
elles  campaign.  Good  American  books  on  the  war 
are  scarce.  The  author  has  depended  for  facts  to  some 
extent  on  The  International  Cyclopedia  annuals  for 
1914,  1915,  1916,  and  1917,  and  on  the  first  two  vol- 
umes of  Frank  H.  Simonds'syl  History  of  the  World  War. 

Other  sources  used  were  Louis  Madelin's  The  Victory 
of  the  Marne,  George  F.  Schreiner's  From  Berlin  to  Bag- 
dad, Lieutenant-Colonel  Paul  Azan's  The  Warfare  of 
Today,  Professor  Douglas  W.  Johnson's  Topography 
and  Strategy  in  the  War,  Sefior  E.  Diaz-Retg's  The 
Attack  on  Verdun,  and  Field  Marshal  Haig's  admirable 
reports  on  British  operations  in  France  from  191 6  to 
1918. 

In  a  volume,  to  be  published  immediately,  entitled 
A  Short  History  of  the  Great  War,  I  shall  outline  more 
in  detail  the  events  and  campaigns  which  have  been 
touched  on  in  this  book  for  the  purpose  ot  illustrating 
the  strategical  problem. 

William  L.  McPherson. 

New  York,  May  1,  1919. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER 

Preface         ...... 

General  Outlines 

I. — The  Moral  Equation 
II. — The  Numerical  Equation 
III. — Germany's  Long  Run  of  Luck 
IV. — Sea  Power  in  the  War 

V. — Development  of  German  Strategy 
VI. — Development  of  Allied  Strategy  . 

Campaigns   and    Battles 

VII. — The  First  Marne 
VIII. — The  Battle  of  Flanders 
IX. — Russia's  Early  Successes 
X. — The  Tragedy  of  Gallipoli 
XI. — The  Creation  of  Mittel-Europa 


i 

20 

40 
60 
80 

100 


119 
139 

158 
178 

199 


XII. — Joffre's  "Nibbling" — The  Development 

of  Positional  Warfare  .         .         .221 


Contents 


CHAPTER  PAGE 

XIII. — Verdux            ......  241 

XIV. — The  Somme — Hindenburg's  Retreat  261 

XV. — Russia's  Collapse — Rumania  .         .281 

XVI. — Germany  Challenges  America        .         .  303 

XVII. — The  West  Front  in  191 7 — Cambrai  324 

XVIII. — Italy's  Part  in  the  War          .          .          .  343 

XIX. — Ludendorff's  Gamble     ....  364 

XX. — Foch's  Victory  Offensive       .         .         .  389 

Index              413 


The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 


The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 


CHAPTER  I 

THE   MORAL   EQUATION 

There  are  two  aspects  to  the  German  debacle — one 
material  and  one  moral.  Speaking  in  the  narrower, 
technical  sense,  Germany  lost  the  war  through  certain 
specific  errors  in  military  policy.  By  November,  1918, 
the  consequences  of  these  blunders  had  brought  the 
German  armies  in  Belgium  and  France  to  the  edge 
of  a  colossal  disaster — an  exaggerated  Sedan  or  Jena. 
The  German  High  Command  elected  to  escape  destruc- 
tion by  surrendering. 

The  German  military  failure  was  unquestionable. 
It  resulted  from  unintelligent  strategy  and  a  misuse 
of  military  resources.  But  the  German  moral  failure 
was  even  more  decisive.  It  resulted  from  the  ines- 
capable limitations  of  the  German  character.  Speak- 
ing in  the  broadest  possible  sense,  Germany  lost  the 


2       The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

war  before  she  began  it.  She  had  the  physical  means 
to  achieve  victory  on  a  limited  scale— to  create,  for  a 
time  at  least,  a  Middle  Europe  dominated  from  Berlin. 
But  she  lacked  the  sagacity  to  temper  her  megalomania. 
Bismarck  was  dead.  He  had  left  no  successors.  So 
the  Germany  of  William  II  bungled  along,  sacrificing 
what  might  have  been  attainable  through  a  prudent 
localization  of  effort  to  empty  and  grandiose  dreams 
of  Teuton  world  empire. 

The  German  leaders  and  people  were  handicapped 
at  critical  stages  of  the  war  by  not  knowing  exactly 
what  they  were  fighting  for.  A  wise  statesman  would 
have  said:  "Let  us  consolidate  our  power  in  Central 
and  Eastern  Europe.  Let  us  throw  a  bridge  across 
the  Bosporus  and  push  our  railheads  to  Badgad.  But 
let  us  stop  there.  That  is  enough  for  our  generation, 
as  the  conquest  of  Alsace-Lorraine  and  the  creation  of 
the  empire  were  enough  for  Bismarck's  generation." 

But  there  were  no  wise  or  moderate  statesmen  left 
in  Germany.  Whenever  things  looked  encouraging 
at  the  front  all  Germans  were  pan-Germans.  In  the 
back  of  the  German  brain  was  the  obsession  of  ethnical 
and  moral  superiority  which  the  pan-German  propa- 
ganda had  so  powerfully  fostered.  All  classes  of  Ger- 
mans were  more  or  less  conscious  of  a  mission  to  go 
out  and  conquer  the  world  and  then  remodel  it  in  the 


The  Moral  Equation  3 

image  of  Kultur.  This  spirit  was  unreasoning  and 
fanatical.  And  since  they  were  all  deeply  affected  by 
it  the  German  leaders  gradually  lost  contact  with  po- 
litical and  military  realities.  They  began  to  envisage 
the  war  not  as  a  struggle  for  limited  territorial  objec- 
tives, or  political  priority  on  the  continent  of  Europe, 
but  as  a  duel  between  a  higher  form  of  civilization 
(their  own,  of  course,  which  was  destined  to  survive), 
and  various  lower  forms  (those  of  their  enemies,  which 
were  destined  to  perish). 

No  illusion  could  have  been  more  baseless  than  that 
the  Germany  of  William  II  was  elected  by  destiny  to 
conquer  and  transform  the  world.  Germany  was  too 
barren  spiritually  and  intellectually  to  play  the  role 
of  Rome  or  of  Revolutionary  France.  She  could 
not  hope  to  establish  an  empire  as  extensive  and 
durable  as  that  of  the  Cassars.  She  could  not  even 
hope  to  establish  one  as  unstable  and  transient  as 
Napoleon's. 

She  had  by  patient  labour  forged  a  military  instrument 
powerful  enough  to  subdue  many  of  her  neighbours. 
But  she  lacked  utterly  the  moral  weapons  with  which 
a  conquering  generation  or  a  conquering  civilization 
must  be  supplied  if  its  sway  is  to  become  permanent 

Rome  possessed  the  indubitable  moral  superiority 
which  reconciles  the  conquered  to  the  rule  of  the  con- 


4       The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

queror.  The  Roman  lawgiver  completed  the  work 
of  the  Roman  legionary.  The  Roman  proconsuls 
brought  the  subject  peoples  peace,  order,  and  security 
under  law.  So  the  golden  age  of  civilized  Europe, 
Asia,  and  Africa  was  the  age  of  Trajan,  Hadrian,  and 
the  Antonines. 

In  the  first  volume  of  The  Decline  and  Fall  of  the 
Roman  Empire,  published  in  1776,  Gibbon  wrote  of  this 
period : 

If  a  man  were  called  to  fix  the  period  in  the  history 
of  the  world  during  which  the  condition  of  the 
human  race  was  most  happy  and  prosperous,  he 
would,  without  hesitation,  name  that  which  elapsed 
from  the  death  of  Domitian  to  the  accession  of 
Commodus. 

The  Romans  were  true  civilizers  and  empire  builders. 
So  were  the  French  in  the  earlier  years  of  the  Revolu- 
tion, when  they  carried  through  Europe  the  torch  of 
liberty  and  the  standard  of  democratic  equality.  The 
peoples  of  the  Netherlands,  Germany,  Austria-Hungary, 
and  Italy,  whom  the  French  freed  from  an  outworn 
feudalism,  welcomed  the  deliverance.  They  benefited 
materially  by  their  change  of  status.  The  introduc- 
tion of  the  French  civil  code,  with  its  equalization  of 
individual  rights,  was,  in  itself,  a  long  step  toward 
modern  civilization. 


The  Moral  Equation  5 

Napoleon  created  the  kingdoms  of  Bavaria  and 
Wurttemberg  and  the  Grand  Duchy  of  Baden.  He 
organized  the  Confederation  of  the  Rhine.  He  en- 
larged Saxony.  All  the  South  German  states  were 
vastly  stimulated  under  the  Napoleonic  regime.  They 
still  owe  it  a  debt  of  gratitude. 

In  one  of  the  many  public  squares  of  Munich  stands 
a  monument  commemorating  the  Bavarian  soldiers 
who  fell  in  Napoleon's  Moscow  campaign.  There  were 
thousands  of  them.  One  of  the  inscriptions  reads: 
Sie  sind  audi  fur  das  Vaterland  gestorben  ("They  also 
died  for  their  country").  Possibly  in  a  larger  measure 
than  the  writer  of  the  inscription  intended,  Bavaria's 
sense  of  obligation  to  Napoleon's  overlordship  is  thus 
acknowledged.  France  carried  into  these  annexed 
countries  ideas  and  a  spirit  of  progress  from  which 
they  profited  enormously,  and  hundreds  of  thousands 
of  their  citizens  fought  without  reluctance  in  the  French 
armies.  It  was  only  when  Napoleon  broke  entirely 
with  the  traditions  of  the  Revolution  and  began  to 
exploit  these  states  cold-bloodedly  in  the  effort  to 
further  his  insane  schemes  of  family  aggrandizement 
that  they  turned  against  him  and  prepared  to  desert 
him. 

Under  Napoleon  Poland  enjoyed  a  brief  political 
restoration.     He  created  out  of  territory  allotted  to 


6       The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Prussia  in  the  Polish  partitions  the  Grand  Duchy  of 
Warsaw.  He  won  the  confidence  of  the  Poles,  although 
his  policy  toward  them  was  plainly  based  on  self- 
interest.  He  drew  on  them  for  a  marshal,  many  gen- 
erals, and  more  than  one  hundred  thousand  soldiers. 
Many  Poles  followed  him  to  France  in  1814. 

Napoleon  delivered  Italy  from  the  Austrian  yoke 
and  gave  the  Italians  a  forestaste  of  national  unity 
when  he  created  the  Kingdom  of  Italy,  with  his  step- 
son Eugene  as  viceroy.  He  gave  the  eastern  Adri- 
atic provinces  autonomy.  Italy's  political  status  was 
greatly  improved  under  the  French  regime.  Spain, 
too,  would  have  remained  a  willing  ally  if  Napoleon 
had  not  fallen  into  the  fatal  error  of  trying  to  establish 
his  brother  Joseph  on  the  Spanish  throne. 

Napoleon's  own  follies  wrecked  an  empire  which 
rested  for  a  time  (and  might  have  continued  to  rest) 
on  the  good  will  of  the  peoples  absorbed  into  it.  But 
there  is  no  known  instance  of  a  subject  people  recon- 
ciling itself  to  German  domination. 

There  is  something  in  the  German  character — a  sur- 
viving strain  of  barbarism,  perhaps — which  stands  in 
the  way  of  any  expression  of  magnanimity  toward  the 
conquered.  The  German  is  no  assimilator.  He  has 
never  been  able  to  impress  supposedly  inferior  peoples 
with  a  sense  of  his  ethnical  or  moral  superiority.     He 


The  Moral  Equation  7 

has,  in  fact,  so  little  confidence  in  his  own  superior- 
ity that  he  has  never  been  willing  to  admit  to  equality 
of  status  or  opportunity  the  subject  and  supposedly 
inferior  peoples  within  the  German  boundaries. 

Inflamed  by  the  arrogant  chauvinism  of  the  pan- 
German  propagandists,  the  German  people  started 
out  in  191 4  to  impose  their  civilization  on  the  rest  of 
the  world.  A  futile  and  pathetically  misguided  con- 
ception! When  had  the  Germans,  under  the  most 
favouring  circumstances,  ever  Teutonized,  or  even 
placated,  another  race  whose  hard  fate  had  brought 
it  under  German  domination? 

At  the  time  of  the  Zabern  incident,  when  Germany 
was  irritated  by  the  thought  that  Alsace  was  still 
unreconciled  and  perhaps  irreconcilable,  the  Berliner 
Tageblatt  published  an  article  comparing  the  feeling  of 
Savoy  and  Nice  toward  France  with  the  feeling  of 
Alsace  and  Lorraine  toward  Germany.  Savoy  and 
Nice  were  acquired  from  Italy  by  Napoleon  III  in 
1859.  Alsace  and  Lorraine  were  acquired  from  France 
by  Bismarck  in  1871.  Only  twelve  years'  difference  in 
time  between  the  two  transactions !  Yet  nobody  but  a 
historian  could  remember  in  19 13  that  Savoy  and  Nice 
had  ever  belonged  to  the  present  royal  house  of  Italy, 
while  the  Zabern  incident  demonstrated  that  Alsace 
and  Lorraine  were  hardly  more  German  in  affection 


8       The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

than  they  were  in  1871 — despite  more  than  forty  years 
of  official  proselyting  and  persecution. 

Alsace-Lorraine  went  to  the  Prussian  school  of  as- 
similation for  forty-eight  years  in  all.  But  she  never 
was  re-Teutonized,  although  her  people  are  of  an  ancient 
German  and  Rhine  Valley  stock.  The  Poles  of  Prus- 
sia had  been  under  German  rule  for  a  century  and  a 
quarter.  In  all  that  period  they  had  been  pitilessly 
restrained  and  disciplined.  Everything  possible  was 
done  to  eradicate  their  race  and  national  spirit.  They 
had  been  forbidden  to  speak  their  own  language.  Their 
lands  had  been  taken  away  from  them  by  a  ruth- 
less policy  of  expropriation.  Yet  they  never  yielded 
to  German  pressure.  They  relied  on  the  superior 
tenacity  of  their  own  race  instincts  and  culture.  And 
they  conquered  at  last.  Parts  of  Poland  which  Prussia 
took  nearly  a  century  and  a  half  ago  are  still  more 
Polish  than  Prussian,  and  have  properly  reverted  to 
the  re-established  Polish  state,  on  whose  coffin  the  three 
sovereigns  of  Russia,  Prussia,  and  Austria-Hungary 
sat — but  sat  in  vain — for  generations. 

There  is  also  North  Schleswig.  This  is  the  Danish 
part  of  the  province  of  Schleswig,  taken  away  from  the 
King  of  Denmark  in  1864  by  Austria  and  Prussia. 
These  two  confederates  divided  Holstein  and  Schleswig 
between  them.     But  Prussia  soon  appropriated  Aus- 


The  Moral  Equation  9 

tria's  share.  By  the  treaty  of  Prague,  under  which 
Austria  legalized  the  Prussian  seizure,  it  was  stipulated 
that  the  inhabitants  of  North  Schleswig  should  have 
the  right  to  determine  by  a  plebiscite  whether  to 
remain  Prussian  or  to  go  back  to  Denmark.  No 
plebiscite  was  ever  taken.  For  more  than  fifty  years 
Prussia  tried  to  assimilate  this  little  Danish  remnant. 
But  all  her  efforts— including  a  proscription  of  the  use 
of  the  Danish  tongue — failed  ignominiously. 

Not  a  single  alien  element  within  the  Prussian 
or  German  body  politic  has  been  reclaimed  through 
the  proselyting  energies  of  German  Kultur.  Physical 
power  is  in  itself  impotent  to  awe  the  mind  or  conquer 
the  imagination.  Only  moral  virility  can  do  that. 
The  prophets  of  German  destiny  looking  out  over  a 
world  on  which  the  stamp  of  German  civilization  was 
to  be  impressed  forgot  the  Alsatian,  Polish,  and  Danish 
fizzles.  They  clung  to  the  primitive  belief  that  the 
sword  is  the  only  civilizer.  They  carried  the  sword 
into  Belgium,  Poland,  the  Baltic  Provinces,  Finland, 
Lithuania,  the  Ukraine,  Serbia,  Albania,  and  Rumania. 
But  everywhere  the  result  was  the  same.  The  German 
conqueror  might  overrun  and  trample  down  peoples. 
He  might  erect  military  governments.  But  nowhere 
was  he  capable  of  really  constructive  and  assimila- 
tive statesmanship.     Nowhere  could  he   conciliate  or 


io      The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

extract  willing  service.  As  an  empire  builder,  because 
of  Teuton  tactlessness,  his  accomplishment  was  almost 
zero. 

German  policy  in  Belgium  was  the  most  hideous 
possible  revelation  of  Germany's  moral  incapacity. 
As  Bethmann-Hollweg  admitted,  the  Germans  seized 
Belgium  in  violation  of  treaty  guarantees.  It  was  an 
act  of  "military  necessity."  Germany  was  therefore 
bound  in  prudence  to  make  the  occupation  as  little 
oppressive  as  practicable  to  the  Belgian  people.  And 
Belgium's  heroic  defence  did  not  lessen  the  obligation 
of  the  invaders  to  deal  generously  with  a  country  which 
had  given  Germany  no  shadow  of  offence  and  whose 
sole  culpability  consisted  in  lying  across  the  easiest 
pathway  of  the  German  armies  into  Northern  France. 

Germany  undoubtedly  envied  Belgium  her  great 
port  of  Antwerp  and  her  strip  of  coast  at  the  eastern 
entrance  to  the  English  Channel.  German  policy 
looked  forward  to  the  ultimate  absorption  of  both 
Holland  and  Belgium.  Statesmanship  therefore  dic- 
tated an  attitude  of  conciliation  on  the  part  of  the 
German  invaders  and  a  powerful  emphasis  of  the 
material  advantages  which  might  accrue  to  the  Bel- 
gians through  closer  association  with  the  German 
Empire. 

But  in  the  heat  of  her  anger  over  the  stubborn  resist- 


The  Moral  Equatio  " 

ance  of  the  Belgians  at  Liege  and  over  some  negligible 
guerilla  fighting  in  the  Liege  and  Namur  districts, 
Germany  unloosed  on  Belgium  those  monstrous  retalia- 
tions which  shocked  the  civilized  world.  A  deliberate 
programme  of  frightfulness  was  carried  out  against  a  de- 
fenceless civilian  population.  After  Aerschot,  Dinant, 
and  Louvain  it  was  next  to  impossible  for  any  Belgian 
to  consider  contact  with  German  civilization  as  any- 
thing but  a  defilement. 

Germany  gained  some  important  military  advantages 
by  violating  Belgian  neutrality.  She  secured  an 
entrance  into  France  and  carried  the  war  to  the  gates 
of  Paris.  But  she  at  once  forced  the  hesitating  British 
Government  into  the  anti-German  alliance.  And  her 
barbarities  behind  the  fighting  lines  not  only  excited 
the  undying  enmity  of  the  Belgians,  but  destroyed  the 
last  vestige  of  German  moral  prestige  in  the  neutral 
world. 

The  German  lifted  his  mask  at  Louvain.  There- 
after no  cunning  or  hypocrisy  on  his  part  could  conceal 
what  a  German  domination  of  Europe  would  mean. 

Yet  in  Belgium  he  had  had  a  real  opportunity  to 
imitate  the  tactics  of  Napoleon  and  to  create  local 
support  by  playing  on  the  racial  prejudices  and  aspira- 
tions of  a  large  disaffected  native  element.  If  Berlin 
had  suppressed  reprisals  with  an  iron  hand  and  had 


12      The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

protected  the  Belgian  population  from  military  terror- 
ism, rapid  progress  might  have  been  made  in  detaching 
the  Flemings  from  the  Walloons. 

There  had  been  a  century-long  antagonism  between 
these  two  Belgian  stocks,  based  mainly  on  a  difference 
in  language.  The  Walloons  spoke  French.  The  Flem- 
ings spoke  their  own  ancient  tongue.  The  former 
idiom  gained  a  complete  ascendancy  under  the  French 
occupation  from  1794  to  1 814.  It  became  the  legal 
language  for  all  Belgium.  After  the  Netherlands  were 
united  under  Dutch  sovereignty  in  181 5  the  use  of 
Flemish  was  gradually  restored  in  Belgian  Flanders. 
This  excited  Walloon  opposition  and  was  one  of  the 
causes  of  the  revolution  of  1830,  when  Belgium  achieved 
her  independence  of  Holland. 

After  independence  French  became  again  the  official 
tongue,  although  the  constitution  indorsed  the  prin- 
ciple of  a  free  choice  in  the  matter  of  languages.  The 
decade  from  1830  to  1840  saw  the  beginnings  of  the 
Flemish  literary  revival,  which  has  persisted  ever  since. 
At  first  it  was  merely  cultural.  But  from  1870  on  it 
assumed  a  political  aspect  also.  Agitations  for  the 
legalization  of  the  use  of  Flemish  in  the  criminal  courts, 
in  the  secondary  schools,  in  the  public  administration, 
and  in  official  documents  were  successful.  In  recent 
years  the  "Flamigants,"  as  they  were  called,  had  been 


The  Moral  Equation  13 

working  to  make  Flemish  the  exclusive  tongue  in  all 
the  Fleming  districts,  compelling  its  adoption  in  the 
whole  school  system  up  to  the  university,  in  local 
administration  and  in  the  relations  of  the  central 
government  with  Flemish  Belgium. 

The  Germans  knew  all  this.  They  had  a  lever 
ready  made  with  which  to  segregate  two  sensitively 
antagonistic  elements  in  the  Belgian  population. 
They  had  the  opportunity  to  pose  as  restorers  of  an 
ancient  native  tongue  akin  to  their  own.  Moreover, 
after  offering  the  Flemings  lingual  freedom,  they  had 
a  chance  to  bind  them  more  securely  to  the  German 
cause  by  offering  them  political  separation  and  complete 
autonomy. 

Yet  German  cunning  could  not  undo  the  work  of 
German  savagery.  The  atrocities  committed  by  the 
German  soldiery  united  the  Walloons  and  Flemings  in 
common  hatred  of  the  invader.  The  breach  between 
the  two  Belgian  stocks  closed  long  before  the  separatist 
intrigue  could  get  fairly  under  way.  It  was  not  until 
December,  191 5,  that  Governor  General  Bissing  con- 
verted the  State  University  of  Ghent  into  a  Flemish 
University.  It  was  not  until  March,  191 7,  that  Bel- 
gium was  partitioned  into  two  military  pro-consulates, 
Brussels  becoming  the  Flemish  capital  and  Namur 
the  Walloon  capital.     Finally,  in  December,   19 17,  a 


14      The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Flemish  legislative  body,  acting  under  German  mili- 
tary authority,  proclaimed  the  complete  independence 
of  Flanders. 

The  few  Belgians  who  were  willing  to  accept  racial 
"self-determination"  from  the  German  oppressor  styled 
themselves  Activists.  They  were  attracted  mostly 
by  the  high  salaries  and  personal  privileges  offered 
them.  But  they  never  had  a  genuine  following.  The 
real  leaders  and  forces  in  the  former  Flemish  movement 
denounced  Activism  as  treason.  The  Activists  were 
"a  staff  without  troops,"  as  the  Germans  themselves 
were  ultimately  forced  to  admit.  The  new  Flemish 
state,  pro-Teuton  in  its  leanings  and  intended  to  form 
the  basis  for  a  completely  Teutonized  Belgium,  re- 
mained to  the  end  a  political  fiction.  The  German 
despoiler,  murderer,  and  terrorist  had  bungled  the  job 
of  the  German  "liberator."  The  Flemings  wished  to 
speak  their  own  language,  even  though  it  was  cousin 
to  the  German.  But  they  shrank  with  abhorrence 
from  any  political  "liberation"  which  might  come  to 
them  from  the  instigators  of  the  Louvain  massacre. 

The  two  German  political  pro-consuls  in  Belgium 
were  Bissing  and  Falkenhausen.  Both  were  typical 
German  bureaucrats,  without  vision  or  humane  instincts. 
Cardinal  Mercier,  who  defied  their  tyranny,  said  of 
them: 


The  Moral  Equation  15 

Falkenhausen  was  more  cruel  and  inhuman  than 
Bissing,  and  more  perfidious,  insidious,  and  danger- 
ous. There  was  not  much  to  choose  between  them, 
however. 

They  were  true  advance  agents  of  the  civilization 
which  Germany  intended  to  inflict  on  the  rest  of  the 
world. 

German  policy  thus  failed  utterly  in  Belgium,  where 
conditions  favoured  local  divisions  and  partial  assimila- 
tion. It  failed  as  conspicuously  in  the  dependencies 
detached  from  Russia.  The  Germans  also  entered 
Poland  as  "liberators."  They  promised  an  end  of 
Russian  misrule.  But  the  Poles  had  had  some  experi- 
ence with  Prussian  methods  of  "liberation."  They 
preferred  Russia's  tender  mercies  to  Prussia's.  They 
endured  for  more  than  three  years  the  joint  German 
and  Austrian  occupation  and  gave  a  passive  assent  to 
German-Austrian  plans  for  creating  a  Polish  buffer 
kingdom,  under  Teuton  protection. 

Their  lot  was  alleviated  by  the  inability  of  Germany 
and  Austria  to  agree  on  the  status  of  the  new  state. 
The  Polish  Regency  Council  was  able  to  play  one  claim- 
ant off  against  the  other.  Both  Germany  and  Austria 
tried  to  recruit  troops  in  Poland.  They  succeeded 
indifferently,  except  in  a  few  districts,  along  the  West 
Galician   border.     The  Poles  had  flocked  by  the  tens 


1 6     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

of  thousands  to  Napoleon's  standard.  But  they  balked 
at  serving  either  Germany  or  Austria.  The  Polish 
Legion,  created  by  the  Regency,  became  in  the  end  a 
national  rather  than  a  vassal  organization.  It  was  a 
peril  rather  than  a  help  to  the  Teuton  allies,  and  it 
turned  with  the  Regency  against  them  both  when  the 
German  situation  on  the  West  Front  became  critical. 

The  Baltic  Provinces  and  Lithuania  were  much  less 
anti-German  than  Poland  was.  Germany  at  least 
promised  and  gave  them  a  sort  of  political  "self-de- 
termination." Economically,  Courland,  Livonia,  and 
Esthonia  had  closer  natural  attachments  to  Germany 
than  to  Russia.  They  were  in  the  German  Baltic 
zone.  But  their  rapprochement  to  Germany  was  half- 
hearted. They  were  willing  to  accept  German  princes 
and  grand  dukes  as  rulers.  But  they  gave  Germany 
little  economic  and  no  military  aid. 

Ukrainia  owed  her  independence  directly  to  Germany 
and  should  have  been  turned  into  a  useful  German  ally. 
She  had  both  grain  and  ' '  cannon  fodder ' '  to  contribute. 
But  here  German  rapacity  again  overrode  sound  mili- 
tary policy.  The  German  satraps  set  out  to  strip  the 
Ukraine  bare  of  food  supplies  the  moment  they  were 
installed  at  Kiev.  They  plundered  and  misgoverned, 
quickly  displacing  the  government  which  signed  the 
treaty  of  Brest-Litovsk  and  substituting  a  dictatorship. 


The  Moral  Equation  17 

Governor-General  Eichhorn  was  assassinated  and  Ger- 
many began  to  do  in  the  Ukraine  exactly  what  she 
had  done  in  Belgium.  Whatever  power  she  retained 
rested  on  the  sword.  The  Ukraine  was  quickly  con- 
verted from  a  political  asset  into  a  political  liability. 

In  Finland  alone  the  Germans  exhibited  some  gleams 
of  political  intelligence.  They  crushed  the  power  of 
the  Bolsheviki  and  restored  a  conservative  govern- 
ment. Finland  cheerfully  accepted  a  German  alliance 
and  could  have  been  converted  into  a  valuable  German 
recruiting  ground,  except  for  the  fact  that  the  alliance 
was  concluded  too  late.  Finland  was  willing  to  fight 
for  Germany  between  March  and  August,  191 8.  After 
August  she  scented  German  disaster  and  was  no  longer 
willing  to  fight. 

If  Germany  had  broken  down  the  Russian  front  a 
year  earlier  than  she  did  she  would  have  had  it  in  her 
power  to  develop  Finland,  Esthonia,  Livonia,  Lithu- 
ania, Courland,  and  the  Ukraine  into  feeders  for  her 
armies,  just  as  Napoleon  had  used  Poland,  Holland, 
Switzerland,  Italy,  and  the  German  states.  But  serious 
mistakes  of  strategy  in  191 6  and  191 7  and  the  utter 
lack  in  her  make-up  of  the  empire-building  instinct 
fortunately  debarred  her  from  exploiting  with  any 
thoroughness  the  populations  assigned  to  her  mercies 
by  the  treaty  of  Brest- Litovsk. 


1 8      The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

World  empire  is  something  incorporeal  as  well  as 
physical.  It  can  be  attained  only  by  nations  which 
add  to  military  power  some  spiritual  ascendancy,  some 
sterling  moral  quality.  Germany,  as  the  war  was  to 
prove  again  and  again,  lacked  imperial  stature.  She 
had  none  of  the  upbuilding,  civilizing  power  of 
Rome,  none  of  the  crusading  fervour  of  Revolu- 
tionary France.  In  her  political  and  military  policy 
she  imitated  rather  the  futile  cruelty  and  materialism 
of  Spain. 

It  was  morally  impossible  for  Germany  to  conquer 
the  world,  since  her  cause  was  bad  and  her  purposes 
were  ignoble.  One  clear-minded  truth-teller  among 
the  Germans  saw  this  from  the  start.  That  was  Dr. 
Wilhelm  Miihlon.  He  wrote  in  his  Diary  on  August 
4,  1 9 14:  "I  cannot  too  often  din  it  into  the  ears  of  the 
Germans  that  what  is  lacking  in  moral  superiority 
cannot  be  replaced  by  force."  And  again:  "Enthusi- 
asm at  the  stare  is  cheap  and  easily  excited.  It  can 
last  only  when  one  fights  for  a  better  cause  and  a  higher 
ideal  than  his  opponents,  and  offers  even  the  opponent 
the  opportunity  of  freedom  and  progress." 

Germany  offered  no  opponent,  even  Russia,  "the 
opportunity  of  freedom  and  progress."  She  did  not 
fight  to  spread  civilization  or  to  benefit  humanity. 
She  fought  to  stay  the  progress  of  the  stars.     There- 


The  Moral  Equation  19 

fore,  in  the  broad  sense,   she  was  doomed  to  defeat 
before  she  drew  the  sword. 

But  in  the  narrower  sense  there  was  no  insuperable 
obstacle  to  her  creating  a  limited  military  empire  in 
Central  Europe  had  she  had  the  intelligence  to  make 
her  strategy  fruitful,  getting  the  best  results  out  of 
her  vast  initial  superiority  in  military  resources. 


CHAPTER  II 

THE   NUMERICAL   EQUATION 

Germany  fell  a  victim  to  delusions  of  grandeur.  In 
his  book,  Germany  and  the  Next  War,  published  in  191 1, 
General  Bernhardi  said  that  the  Germans  would  be 
obliged  in  the  near  future  to  choose  between  "world 
power  and  downfall." 

That  phrase  summed  up  the  empty  imaginings  of 
the  pan-German  agitation.  A  rational  German  mili- 
tary policy  in  191 1  or  in  1914  would  not  have  contem- 
plated two  such  alternatives.  If  Prussia  intended  to 
engage  in  another  war  of  conquest,  she  had  only  to 
follow  the  precedents  set  by  Frederick  the  Great  in 
the  eighteenth  century  and  by  Moltke  and  Bismarck 
in  the  nineteenth.  Those  precedents  did  not  compel 
a  gamble  between  world  power  and  ruin. 

The  Prussian  state  was  a  slow  growth.  First,  it 
embraced  only  the  petty  Mark  of  Brandenburg.  Then 
the  Duchy  of  East  Prussia  was  acquired.  Pomerania 
was  conquered  from   the   Swedes;  West   Prussia  and 


The  Numerical  Equation  21 

Posen  were  taken  from  the  Poles;  Silesia  was  grabbed 
from  Austria,  and  a  considerable  part  of  Saxony  from 
the  Saxons.  The  Rhine  province  was  acquired  at  the 
Congress  of  Vienna. 

Such  was  Prussia's  extent  after  the  epoch  of  Frederick 
the  Great.  This  erratic  genius  nearly  swamped  his 
kingdom  in  the  Seven  Years'  War.  His  ambition  led 
him,  with  only  casual  support  from  England,  into  a 
struggle  with  a  great  European  coalition,  comprising 
Austria,  Saxony,  France,  Sweden,  and  Russia.  The 
odds  against  him  were  far  heavier  than  the  odds 
against  Germany  in  19 14.  He  was  saved  by  his  ex- 
traordinary luck  and  by  his  own  great  military  tal- 
ents. But  he  never  aimed  at  conquering  Europe. 
His  policy  was  one  of  conquest  on  a  modest  instalment 
plan. 

Bismarck  followed  Frederick  the  Great's  example, 
but  moved  with  greater  caution.  He  got  Prussia  into 
no  war  in  which  she  would  have  to  fight  at  a  disad- 
vantage. As  a  consequence  he  succeeded  in  annexing 
Schleswig-Holstein,  Hanover,  Hesse-Cassel,  and  Nassau, 
ejecting  Austria  from  the  German  household,  creating 
the  modern  Prussianized  German  Empire,  and  attaching 
Alsace-Lorraine  to  it  as  a  crownland. 

Victory  over  France  in  1870-71  made  Germany  the 
first   military    power   in    Europe.     The    alliance    with 


22      The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Austria-Hungary  and  Italy,  which  Bismarck  concluded, 
secured  Germany  thereafter  against  a  counter  attack. 
For  more  than  forty  years  she  nursed  her  resources 
with  a  view  to  improving  her  Continental  position 
through  another  successful  war.  When  the  time  came 
she  was  perfectly  prepared  to  enlarge  her  European 
holdings.  The  chances  were  all  heavily  in  her  favour 
if  she  could  confine  the  war  to  Europe. 

If  Bismarck  had  been  in  power,  or  if  the  newer 
generation  had  been  able  to  produce  a  statesman  of  his 
calibre,  the  war  of  1914  would  probably  have  followed 
the  course  of  the  wars  of  1866  and  1870.  Germany 
would  have  emerged  from  it  with  an  enlarged  "place 
in  the  sun."  She  would  have  been  content  to  digest 
her  acquisitions  and  to  prepare  patiently  for  further 
expansion. 

But  Bismarck's  successors,  handicapped  by  having 
to  cope  with  the  instability  and  restless  vainglory  of 
William  II,  had  allowed  the  Triple  Alliance  to  be  under- 
mined. Italy  had  been  estranged  by  a  series  of  diplo- 
matic blunders.  By  19 14  she  had  become  merely  a 
nominal  ally — a  neutral,  likely  in  time  of  trial  to  be 
converted  into  an  enemy.  Yet  even  with  Italy  hostile, 
Germany  was  still  equal  to  fighting  another  prosperous 
European  war.  She  was  fully  conscious  of  her  strength. 
She  was,  in  fact,  so  confident  of  it  that  in  taking  on 


The  Numerical  Equation  23 

a  struggle  with  France  and  Russia  she  was  willing  to 
attack  Belgium  and  thereby  certainly  force  Great 
Britain  from  the  outset  into  the  circle  of  her 
enemies. 

Germany  was  justified  in  the  military  sense  in  her 
contempt  of  the  mere  factor  of  numbers.  Those  who 
visualized  the  war  merely  as  a  contest  between  masses 
of  population — to  be  decided  on  the  basis  of  attrition — 
were  misled  into  proclaiming  from  the  very  beginning 
that  Germany  must  lose  because  she  was  so  manifestly 
weaker  in  man  power.  Hilaire  Belloc  was  perhaps  the 
most  conspicuous  champion  of  the  attrition  theory — 
a  theory  which  enjoyed  much  favour  with  the  Allied 
publics  in  the  days  of  Joffre's  enforced  policy  of  "nib- 
bling" on  the  Western  Front.  But  this  theory  was 
unsound.  There  were  other  factors  more  important 
than  numbers.  Russia  was  soon  to  prove  this.  The 
most  populous  of  the  major  belligerents,  she  turned  out 
to  be  the  most  un  dependable  and  was  the  first  to  go  to 
the  wall. 

On  the  census  returns  the  Central  Powers  were  out- 
numbered in  1 9 14  and  191 5  more  than  two  to  one. 
But  the  census  figures  were  no  true  index  of  military 
strength.  Taking  the  population  returns  of  the  years 
immediately  preceding  the  war  the  man-power  equation 
stood  something  like  this: 


24     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

THE    CENTRAL    POWERS 

Germany 68,000,000 

Austria-Hungary 52,000,000 

Turkey 21 ,000,000 

Bulgaria  (entered  the  war  in  1915)  4,750,000 

Total 145,750,000 

THE    ENTENTE    POWERS 

France  (without  her  colonies) 39,600,000 

The  United  Kingdom 46,000,000 

Canada,    Australia,    New    Zealand, 

and  South  Africa 20,000,000 

Belgium 7,500,000 

Serbia  and  Montenegro 3,500,000 

Portugal 6,000,000 

Russia 178,000,000 

Italy  (entered  the  war  in  1915) 35,000,000 

Total 335,600,000 

The  balance  was  turned  still  more  heavily  against 
Germany  by  the  entrance  into  the  war  of  Japan  (which, 
however,  operated  only  in  the  Far  East  and  sent  no 
troops  to  Europe) ;  by  the  use  which  France  was  able 
to  make  of  her  African  colonies,  from  which  she  drew 
more  than  five  hundred  thousand  regulars  and  auxilia- 
ries; and  by  the  forces  which  Great  Britain  eventually 
raised  in  British  India,  Ceylon,  and  the  other  Asiatic 
colonies.  By  191 8  India  alone  had  furnished  more 
than  one  million  men  (mostly  auxiliaries). 

But  there  is  a  vast  difference  between  paper  man 


The  Numerical  Equation  25 

power  and  mobilized,  trained,  and  equipped  man  power. 
In  a  European  war  which  would  be  won  or  lost  within 
four  years  the  Central  Powers  were  certain  not  to  be 
outnumbered  in  the  field  at  any  time  within  the  first 
three  years.  They  were  certain  to  have  an  actual 
preponderance  in  military  strength  throughout  the 
greater  part  of  the  conflict. 

What  were  the  requirements  of  the  Central  Powers 
on  the  various  fronts?  Germany  could  mobilize  about 
2,000,000  in  the  first  months  of  the  war  and  2,000,000 
more  by  the  spring  of  19 15.  France  and  Great  Britain 
together  could  mobilize  hardly  1,500,000  in  the  first 
months  and  put  hardly  1,500,000  more  in  the  field  by 
the  spring  of  191 5. 

Austria-Hungary  could  mobilize  1,500,000  in  1914 
and  have  1,000,000  more  available  in  1915.  Russia 
had  an  inexhaustible  man  power;  but  she  could  hardly 
hope  at  any  time  to  arm,  equip,  and  maintain  in  the 
fighting  lines  more  than  3,500,000  men.  Turkey  could 
be  counted  on  to  hold  her  own  pretty  well  for  a  couple 
of  years  against  the  Russians  in  Armenia  and  the  Brit- 
ish in  Mesopotamia  and  Palestine,  unless  the  Allies 
could  carry  the  Dardanelles  by  a  surprise  attack. 

The  full  strength  of  the  three  major  Central  Powers 
was  available  in  the  earlier  stages  of  the  war.  But 
Great  Britain,  which  lacked  even  the  rudiments  of  a 


26      The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

military  system,  could  not  develop  her  land  strength 
before  the  middle  of  191 6,  or  make  any  highly  effective 
use  of  it  until  the  middle  of  19 17.  But  by  the  middle 
of  191 6  the  Russian  collapse  had  already  begun. 

Germany  needed  on  the  West  Front  in  1914  about 
1,500,000  men  and  on  the  East  Front  about  500,000. 
Russia's  unexpected  victories  -iri  Galicia  increased  the 
German  burden  in  the  East,  where  Austria-Hungary 
proved  unequal  to  the  task  assigned  her.  But  in  191 5 
Germany  had  man  power  enough  to  defend  her  lines  in 
France  and  Belgium  and  to  go  East,  relieve  Galicia, 
conquer  Poland  and  Courland,  invade  Lithuania  and 
Russia  proper,  and  overrun  Serbia,  Montenegro,  and 
Albania.  She  was  able  to  crush  Russia  and  at  the  same 
time  to  create  an  ample  strategical  reserve — much  of 
which  was  to  be  foolishly  wasted  in  191 6  at  Verdun. 

Even  the  entrance  of  Italy  into  the  war  in  May, 
191 5,  did  not  challenge  German  superiority  or  wrest 
the  offensive  from  the  German  High  Command.  Italy 
spent  a  year  and  a  half  trying  to  make  an  impres- 
sion on  the  Austrian  defences  in  the  Alps  and  behind 
the  Isonzo.  Before  the  Italian  attack  could  become 
threatening  the  Russians  had  been  flung  back  to  the 
line  of  the  Dvina  River  and  the  Pripet  Marshes,  and 
Austria-Hungary  could  safely  transfer  her  best  troops 
to  the  Italian  front. 


The  Numerical  Equation  27 

The  sufficiency  of  German  (Central  Allied)  numbers 
for  a  strictly  European  war  is  best  attested  by  the 
fact  that,  except  in  Turkey,  the  Central  Powers  were 
able  to  maintain  the  offensive  almost  uninterruptedly 
throughout  the  struggle.  The  German  General  Staff 
imposed  its  strategy  on  the  Entente.  I  It  was  not  until 
July,  191 8,  when  American  man  power  became  avail- 
able, that  the  offensive  passed  definitely  and  irrevocably 
into  Allied  hands. 

The  attrition  theory  of  19 14  and  191 5  therefore 
broke  down  absolutely,  in  so  far  as  it  was  based  on 
the  discrepancy  in  numbers  between  the  Central  States 
and  the  original  members  of  the  Entente.  Mere  num- 
bers are  not  equivalent  to  military  strength.  The  two- 
to-one  advantage  of  the  Entente  in  population  was 
offset  by  the  obstacles  in  the  way  ot  a  conversion  of 
latent  war  power  into  military  energy.  Time  was 
one  of  these  obstacles.  Others  were  an  unfavourable 
geographical  position,  deficiency  in  military  training 
and  equipment,  greater  industrial  unpreparedness  for 
war,  and  lack  of  unified  leadership.  All  these  weighed 
heavily  against  the  Entente,  making  its  impressive  nu- 
merical preponderance  only  a  tantalizing  and  elusive  as- 
set. The  superior  masses  at  the  disposition  of  the  Allied 
governments  could  not  hope  to  wear  down  the  Teuton 
armies  so  long  as  the  latter  enjoyed  the  enormous  ad- 


28     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

vantages  (in  addition  to  actual  equality  on  the  fighting 
lines)  of  better  equipment,  heavier  guns,  interior  lines 
of  communication,  unified  strategy,  and  the  freedom  of 
action  which  accompanies  possession  of  the  offensive. 

Parallels  in  military  history  are  often  highly  mis- 
leading, because  they  ignore  vital  changes  in  military 
conditions.  Theoretically  the  situation  of  the  Central 
Powers  may  have  seemed  in  1914,  1915,  and  191 6  al- 
most as  hopeless  as  the  situation  of  Prussia  during  the 
Seven  Years'  War.  The  Central  States  were  beleaguered 
as  Prussia  was.  France,  Great  Britain,  Italy,  and 
Russia  were  at  first  glance  as  overpowering  a  hostile 
combination  as  France,  Saxony,  Austria,  and  Russia, 
had  been.  But  it  was,  in  fact,  nothing  like  so  over- 
powering, as  events  were  to  prove.  Frederick  the 
Great  owed  his  salvation  to  a  change  of  sovereigns  in 
Russia,  Peter  III  reversing  the  policy  of  the  Empress 
Elizabeth  and  going  over  to  the  side  of  Prussia. 

But  in  this  war  Russia,  a  colossus  in  extent  and  num- 
bers compared  to  what  she  was  in  1762,  was  actually 
defeated  in  the  field  before  she  deserted  the  Entente 
coalition.  Cut  off  from  her  allies  and  limited  in  indus- 
trial resources,  she  could  not  stand  the  killing  pace  of 
modern  war.  She  had  yielded  in  1904-05  to  the  nu- 
merically inferior  strength  of  Japan.  Now  she  yielded 
to  the  numerically  inferior  strength  of  Germany. 


The  Numerical  Equation  29 

In  Frederick  the  Great's  time  a  soldier  was  a  soldier. 
The  Russians  were  not  far  below  the  Prussians  or  the 
French  in  fighting  and  staying  power.  They  stood  up 
against  Napoleon  in  many  battles.  They  defeated  him 
at  Eylau.  The  weapons  of  that  day  put  all  armies 
more  or  less  on  an  equality,  if  courage  and  endurance 
were  equal.  In  the  smaller  armies  of  the  eighteenth 
century  and  the  first  half  of  the  nineteenth  century 
there  was  far  more  evenness  of  quality.  Under  uni- 
versal service  the  military  defects  of  the  backward 
nations  became  accentuated.  In  his  book  A  Nation 
Trained  in  Arms  or  a  Militia?  published  in  191 8,  Lieu- 
tenant-General  Baron  Freytag-Loringhoven,  Deputy 
Chief  of  the  German  General  Staff,  who  had  himself 
served  when  a  young  man  in  the  Russian  army,  says 
very  justly: 

Far  too  many  of  the  conditions  which  at  one  time 
contributed  to  the  efficiency  of  the  Russian  troops 
ceased  to  exist  after  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth 
century;  they  could  not,  indeed,  any  longer  exist. 

In  modern  war,  too,  equipment  has  become  a  domi- 
nant factor.  War  is  largely  a  contest  in  mechanical 
efficiency.  In  such  a  contest  Russia  was  outclassed 
from  the  start.  Relatively,  she  was  more  outclassed 
than  Turkey.  For  from  the  autumn  of  19 15  on  Ger- 
man military  supplies  could  move  freely  into  Turkey, 


30      The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

while  the  supplies  which  the  Allies  could  furnish  Russia 
were  inadequate  to  prevent  the  great  Russian  retreat 
of  the  summer  of  191 5,  which  was  the  beginning  of 
Russia's  downfall. 

Short  interior  lines  united  the  German  Western  and 
Eastern  fronts.  The  Prussian  railway  system  had 
been  specially  constructed  to  facilitate  transfers  from 
one  front  to  the  other.  It  is  but  four  hundred  miles 
from  the  Rhine  to  the  Vistula,  and  only  the  troops 
themselves  had  to  be  shifted,  since  there  were  ample 
artillery  and  supply  depots  behind  the  two  fighting 
areas. 

France  and  Great  Britain,  on  the  other  hand,  had 
only  the  most  meagre  communications  with  Russia. 
They  were  barred  by  the  Dardanelles  forts  from  the 
warm  water  route  to  the  Black  Sea  ports.  They  could 
not  bring  out  food  supplies,  of  which  Southern  Russia 
had  a  surplus,  or  send  in  munitions  and  heavy  guns, 
which  the  Russian  armies  lacked.  The  only  open 
paths  by  sea  were  to  Kola  and  Archangel,  or  to  Vladi- 
vostok. But  Russia's  railroad  system  from  the  Arctic 
ports  or  from  the  Pacific  was  utterly  inadequate  to 
handle  the  supply  cargoes  landed  by  Allied  or  neutral 
ships.  Russia  could  last  as  a  real  military  factor  only 
until  her  own  resources  failed.  And  both  her  resources 
and  her  morale  were  failing  from  the  middle  of  1915  on. 


The  Numerical  Equation  3 l 

Germany  entered  the  war  immensely  better  supplied 
with  heavy  artillery  than  France  was.  It  took  France 
nearly  two  years  to  overcome  the  handicap.  Great 
Britain  was  totally  unsupplied  at  the  start.  She  could 
not  expect  to  make  up  her  deficiencies  within  three 
years.     Russia  never  made  hers  up. 

When  Mackensen  launched  his  great  drive  on  the 
Dunajec  in  May,  191 5,  his  superiority  in  artillery  over 
the  Russians  was  stupendous.  His  guns  smothered 
the  Russian  fire.  The  march  from  the  Dunajec  to 
Volhynia  was  an  artillerists'  parade.  The  infantry 
merely  had  to  seize  the  enemy  positions  which  the 
German  big  guns  had  made  untenable.  In  war  like 
this  numbers  on  the  Russian  side  became  an  incon- 
sequential factor.  Numbers  were,  in  fact,  at  times  only 
a  hindrance  to  the  Russian  retreat.  So  long  as  the 
German  artillery  kept  advancing  the  Russian  armies 
had  to  keep  on  retiring. 

The  same  thing  happened  later  in  the  year  in  Serbia. 
Alexander  F.  L.  Roda-Roda,  a  brilliant  Viennese  liter- 
ary man  and  war  correspondent,  wrote  a  description 
of  the  Serbian  campaign  which  vividly  and  humorously 
described  this  new  aspect  of  war.  Campaigning  was 
conducted  on  stop-watch,  union-labour  principles.  The 
artillery  worked  every  morning  from  eight  o'clock 
until    noon.     The    supporting   infantry   worked   from 


32      The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

noon  until  4  P.M.  Then  the  batteries  were  hauled 
forward  to  the  demolished  Serbian  positions,  which 
the  infantry  had  occupied. 

This  mechanical  advance  continued  for  weeks 
through  the  Serbian  mountains.  The  batteries  were 
out  of  range  of  the  enemy  guns.  They  went  through 
their  daily  practice  undisturbed.  Even  the  infantry 
rarely  saw  a  Serbian  soldier. 

There  is  an  element  of  exaggeration  in  this  descrip- 
tion. But  it  throws  an  interesting  sidelight  on  the 
superiority  in  the  mechanical  appliances  of  modern 
war  which  Germany  possessed — especially  against 
opponents  on  the  Eastern  Front — and  which  made  her 
campaigns  in  Galicia,  Poland,  and  Serbia  in  191 5  and 
her  campaign  in  Rumania  in  1916  seem  more  or  less 
like  a  Kriegspiel,  with  the  uncertainties  of  war 
eliminated. 

In  the  winter  of  1914-15  Field  Marshal  Hindenburg, 
then  just  risen  to  fame,  said  of  the  Russians  that  they 
fought  well  in  trenches,  thus  maintaining  the  defensive 
traditions  of  the  Russian  armies.  But  he  predicted 
their  defeat  because  they  were  inferior  to  the  Germans 
in  education  and  moral  discipline,  and  because  victory 
must  go  to  the  combatant  with  the  "stronger  nerves." 
This  was  only  another  way  of  saying  that  the  Russians 
would  be  unable  to  stand  up  against  the  mechanical 


The  Numerical  Equation  33 

superiority  of  the  Germans.  Men  get  discouraged 
fighting  against  machinery.  Had  the  Russians  had 
the  better  technical  equipment  the  weakness  in 
"nerves"  would  have  been  all  on  the  Teuton  side.  In 
the  last  half  of  191 8,  in  fact,  Germany  showed  the 
white  feather  on  the  Western  Front,  after  less  punish- 
ment than  the  Russian  armies  had  suffered  in  191 5  in 
the  retreat  from  the  Dunajec. 

Germany  was  the  first  belligerent  to  use  the  big 
Skoda  and  Krupp  type  of  siege  howitzer  which  bat- 
tered down  the  forts  of  Liege,  Namur,  and  Antwerp. 
She  first  produced  the  long  range  weapons  of  the  sort 
which  bombarded  Dunkirk  and  Paris.  She  was  the 
first  to  employ  high  explosive  shells  and  to  develop 
the  massed  artillery  offensive.  She  was  the  inventor  of 
the  flame  thrower,  of  the  poison  gas  wave,  and  poison 
gas  shell.  Armed  with  these  instruments  of  "fright- 
fulness"  she  could  well  afford  to  discount  Allied  pre- 
ponderance in  crude  man  power. 

The  Central  States  were  not  long  in  achieving  unity 
of  command.  Austria-Hungary  was  quickly  cured 
of  all  ambition  for  co-belligerency  with  Germany. 
Berlin  gave  Vienna  plenty  of  rope  in  the  early  months 
of  the  war.  It  was  a  wise  policy.  Thereafter  the  Aus- 
trians  meekly  took  orders  from  the  German  General 
Staff. 


34      The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

The  Austro-Hungarians  expected  to  play  a  great 
role  on  the  Eastern  Front.  Germany  had  decided  in 
August,  1 914,  to  throw  almost  her  entire  mobilized 
strength  into  France.  She  left  less  than  five  hundred 
thousand  men  in  East  Prussia — merely  second  line 
material.  They  were  to  hold  off  a  Russian  invasion 
from  Northern  Poland  while  the  Austro-Hungarians 
took  the  offensive  in  Southern  Poland,  striking  for 
Lublin  and  trying  to  isolate  Warsaw. 

It  was  a  bold  conception.  It  failed  completely,  how- 
ever, because  both  Vienna  and  Berlin  had  counted  on 
a  tardy  Russian  mobilization. 

An  Austro-Hungarian  army  under  Dankl  moved 
north-east  from  the  Vistula  into  Poland.  It  won  a 
victory  at  Krasnik  and  advanced  confidently  toward 
Lublin.  Had  it  reached  this  town  the  Russians  would 
have  been  obliged  to  abandon  the  line  of  the  Vistula 
from  Warsaw  south  to  Ivangorod,  as  they  had  to 
abandon  it  a  year  later  when  Mackensen  followed  in 
Dankl's  footsteps. 

Dankl  was  supported  on  his  right  by  Auffenberg, 
and  the  latter' s  right  was  extended  in  a  curve  to  cover 
Lemberg.  But  the  Russian  mobilization  on  the  line 
of  Brest- Litovsk  had  been  effected  with  great  rapidity. 
Russian  armies  appeared  from  the  north-east,  east,  and 
south-east,  executing  a  concentric  movement  on  Lem- 


The  Numerical  Equation  35 

berg.  The  Austro-Hungarian  forces  south  of  the  city 
were  driven  back  and  Auffenberg  was  badly  beaten 
on  the  sector  north  of  it,  at  Rawa-Russka.  The  con- 
nection between  Auffenberg  and  Dankl  was  broken 
and  the  Austro-Hungarian  armies  were  chased  back 
in  disorder  beyond  the  San  and  the  Carpathians. 

It  was  a  bitter  humiliation  to  the  Austrian  General 
Staff,  but  a  wholesome  one.  From  the  winter  of  1914- 
15  on  the  Austrian  military  establishment  was  virtu- 
ally absorbed  into  the  German.  The  Austrians  fought 
no  more  offensives  of  their  own,  although  Germany 
later  turned  over  to  them  the  defence  of  Trieste  and 
the  Trentino.  All  the  strategy  of  the  Central  Powers 
was  shaped  absolutely  in  Berlin,  and  this  unity  of 
direction  was  worth  many  army  corps. 

The  original  Entente  Powers  never  achieved  unified 
military  control.  With  two  wholly  detached  fronts, 
a  close  co-ordination  of  military  effort  was  impossible. 
Russia  had  to  go  her  own  way.  Later  Italy  went  her 
own  way.  The  British  and  Russians  never  co-operated 
in  Asiatic  Turkey. 

On  the  Western  Front  proper  the  British  and  the 
French  fought  side  by  side.  France  was  the  natural 
leader.  But  the  increasing  importance  of  the  British 
military  contribution  made  it  exceedingly  difficult  for 
Great   Britain   to   forego   independence   of   command. 


36      The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

National  pride  and  sensitiveness  stood  in  the  way  of 
military  efficiency. 

The  Italian  disaster  at  Caporetto,  in  the  fall  of  191 7, 
and  the  British  disaster  before  St.  Quentin,  in  the 
spring  of  191 8,  were  particularly  striking  demonstra- 
tions of  the  cost  of  disunity  of  leadership.  But  even 
then  unity  would  hardly  have  been  accomplished  except 
for  the  intervention  of  the  United  States.  The  Ameri- 
can command  had  no  pride  of  opinion.  American 
influence  in  Allied  councils,  added  to  the  saving  com- 
mon sense  of  Premier  Lloyd  George,  finally  forced 
Foch's  selection  as  generalissimo.  That  was  one  of 
America's  greatest  contributions  to  Allied  victory. 
It  made  a  real  Allied  offensive  possible  for  the  first 
time  since  August,   19 14. 

Germany  really  lost  the  war  in  the  winter  of  191 6-1 7, 
when  she  hounded  the  United  States  out  of  neutrality 
and  into  belligerency.  But  the  Allies  did  not  put 
themselves  in  a  position  to  win  the  war  until  they 
decided  to  fight  as  a  unit,  and  not  separately. 

Looking  back  to  the  beginnings  of  the  war,  the  cal- 
culations as  to  its  outcome  based  on  population  and 
the  attrition  theory  seem  more  than  ever  grotesque. 
In  a  contest  between  the  original  groups  of  belligerents 
(including  Italy)  numbers  would  not  have  won.  It  is 
clear  now  that  Germany  failed  only  because  she  car- 


The  Numerical  Equation  37 

ried  the  war  to  America.  Otherwise  she  had  sufficient 
resources  and  enjoyed  enough  military  advantages  to 
win  at  least  a  partial  victory.  And  even  a  draw  would 
have  been  a  victory  for  her,  so  long  as  she  retained 
control  of  that  Middle  Europe  which  she  had  erected 
out  of  the  territory  of  Austria-Hungary,  Bulgaria,  and 
Turkey. 

Germany  had  the  troops,  artillery,  munitions,  techni- 
cal appliances,  and  organization  to  win  with.  She  had 
competent  generals  of  division  and  generals  of  armies. 
But  she  was  woefully  lacking  in  genuine  political  and 
military  leaders, 

Maximilian  Harden  said  of  William  II  that  he  was 
only  a  "showman."  His  cheap  theatrical  quality  was 
not  unknown  to  the  men  who  surrounded  him  and  in 
a  measure  controlled  him.  But  his  faults  were  their 
faults  also.  Neither  in  the  group  of  statesmen  and 
diplomats  nor  in  the  group  of  military  men  into 
whose  hands  the  destinies  of  Germany  fell  after  war 
was  declared  was  there  one  figure  of  first-class  ability. 
German  public  life  had  become  sterile.  The  Imperial 
Chancellors,  from  Bethmann-Hollweg  to  Maximilian  of 
Baden,  were  mere  place  holders,  without  authority, 
convictions,  or  courage.  They  were  the  tools  of  the 
military  group.  Prince  Bulow  was  the  only  civilian 
in  Germany  fit  to  be  compared  with  the  Bismarckian 


38     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

generation.  And  neither  the  Emperor  nor  the  military 
autocrats  wanted  to  make  use  of  his  at  least  respectable 
abilities. 

In  the  military  group  Tirpitz  and  Ludendorff  stood 
out  —  both  narrow,  domineering,  parochial-minded, 
typical  of  all  that  was  worst  temperamentally  and 
intellectually  in  modern  Germany.  These  two  made 
a  wreck  of  German  military  policy.  Their  leadership 
offset  the  indubitable  strategic  advantages  which 
Germany  possessed.  By  changing  the  character  of 
the  war  they  made  it  impossible  for  Germany  to  end 
it  without  unexampled  disaster.  They  took  seriously 
the  Bernhardi  alternative  of  "world  power  or  down- 
fall." And  they  sought  world  power  in  so  senseless 
a  manner  as  to  make  downfall  inevitable. 

In  the  two  or  three  decades  before  19 14  the  German 
mind  had  become  corroded  with  chauvinism.  Modesty, 
moderation,  self -distrust  had  become  less  than  ever  Ger- 
man characteristics.  Imitating  the  Kaiser,  all  Germans 
of  light  and  leading  assumed  a  tone  of  boastfulness  and 
self-glorification.     Says  Dr.  Miihlon: 

At  home  the  social  and  political  leaders  acted 
as  though  the  German  was  at  the  forefront  the 
world  over  and  was  its  ideal  of  the  coming  man, 
since  his  culture,  his  power,  his  principles,  his  aims 
were  higher  and  broader  than  those  of  all  other 
peoples. 


The  Numerical  Equation  39 

All  Germans  who  were  in  a  position  to  influence  the 
policy  of  the  government  thought  alike.  And  under 
these  leaders,  puffed  with  egomania,  the  German 
people  rushed  down  a  precipice  into  the  sea.  Germany 
was  not  destroyed  by  the  weight  of  outside  numbers. 
She  was  destroyed  by  madness  within.  She  had  no- 
thing to  fear  from  Russia's  175,000,000  moujiks.  Her 
star  set  when  she  deliberately  expanded  a  European  war 
into  a  world  war,  thereby  neutralizing  and  nullifying 
the  enormous  military  advantages  which  would  have 
enabled  her  to  break  down  the  original  European  coali- 
tion against  her  and  might  have  enabled  her  to  create 
a  Teutonized  empire  stretching  from  Berlin  to  Badgad, 
from  Hamburg  to  Herat. 


CHAPTER  III 
Germany's  long  run  of  luck 

The  Goddess  of  Fortune  was  overgenerous  to  the 
Germans.  They  took  her  gifts  arrogantly.  They 
had  none  of  the  old  Greek  dread  of  her  uninterrupted 
favour.  They  presumed  on  their  good  luck  as  no  other 
nation  has  ever  done.  But  Fortune  had  her  revenge. 
By  the  time  she  was  ready  to  turn  her  face  away  she 
had  killed  the  Germans  with  overkindness. 

Schiller  wrote  a  famous  short  poem,  entitled  The 
Ring  of  Polykrates.  All  Germany  has  known  the  work 
for  more  than  a  century.  But  modern  Germany  had 
lost  the  sense  of  the  words.  Schiller  retold  the  Greek 
legend  of  a  king  of  Samos,  whose  good  fortune  was 
phenomenal.  His  guest,  an  exiled  king  of  Egypt,  be- 
came alarmed  about  this  ominous  run  of  luck,  and 
advised  Polykrates  to  throw  into  the  sea  the  thing  he 
valued  most  in  his  whole  kingdom.  Polykrates  sacri- 
ficed his  favourite  ring.     Next  day  a  fisherman  brought 

a  fish  to  the  palace  as  a  present,  and  when  the  cook 

40 


Germany's  Long  Run  of  Luck      41 

cut  it   open   the   king's   ring   appeared.     The   former 
Egyptian  monarch  took  his  leave  in  haste,  exclaiming : 

Die  Cotter  wollen  dein  Verderben. 
Fort  eiV  ich,  nicht  mit  dir  zu  sterben. 

[The  gods  are  bent  on  your  destruction. 
I  hurry  away,  so  as  not  to  die  with  you.] 

Germany  was  a  spoiled  child  of  fortune  during  the 
first  two  and  a  half  years  of  the  war.  But  she  never 
sought  to  placate  the  fates.  She  never  made  a  single  sac- 
rifice to  superstition  or  prudence.  The  U-boat  was  her 
ring  of  Polykrates.  She  would  not  abate  its  illegal  and 
monstrous  use.     And  that  decision  brought  her  to  ruin. 

It  is  worth  while  recalling  the  many  good  turns 
by  which  Germany  benefited.  Her  first  extraordinary 
piece  of  luck  was  the  escape  to  Constantinople  of  the 
Goeben  and  the  Breslau.  These  two  warships  were 
trapped  in  the  Mediterranean.  They  were  obliged  to 
go  to  Messina  to  coal.  They  should  have  been  hemmed 
in  from  the  south  and  east  and  driven  toward  Gibraltar. 
But  steaming  out  of  Messina  they  made  for  the  Dar- 
danelles, evading  the  Allied  squadrons  lying  in  wait 
for  them.  Their  arrival  at  Constantinople  assured 
Turkey's  accession  to  the  Central  Alliance.  They 
were  nominally  transferred  to  the  Young  Turk  govern- 
ment.    But   the   Young  Turk  leaders,   working    hand 


42      The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

in  glove  with  the  German  Ambassador,  Baron  Wangen- 
heim,  used  the  big  battle-cruiser  Goeben  to  terrorize 
the  population  of  the  Turkish  capital  and  also  to  con- 
duct the  raid  on  the  northern  Black  Sea  ports,  which 
put  Turkey  dramatically  into  the  war  through  an  overt 
act  against  Russia. 

If  the  Goeben  and  Breslau  had  been  captured — or 
even  the  Goeben  alone — Turkey's  participation  might 
have  been  delayed — possibly  prevented.  The  Allied 
admiralties  had  calculated  that  the  Goeben  and  the 
Breslau  would  not  run  for  the  Dardanelles,  since  the 
Treaty  of  Paris,  of  1856,  and  the  Treaty  of  London,  of 
1871,  both  provided  that  warships  should  not  use  the 
straits  except  by  special  permission  of  the  Sultan,  which 
could  be  granted  only  in  time  of  peace.  When  the 
Allied  commanders  found  that  the  two  German  war 
vessels  had  entered  the  straits,  a  true  appreciation  of 
the  emergency  would  have  led  them  to  force  that  bar- 
rier themselves.  It  was  one  of  the  critical  moments  of 
the  war.  But,  as  was  to  be  the  case  for  the  next  three 
years  with  Allied  policy  in  the  Near  East,  military 
advantage  was  sacrificed  to  timidity,  irresolution,  and 
foolish  preconceptions. 

In  his  book,  Ambassador  Morgenthau 's  Story,  the  ob- 
servant American  envoy  to  Constantinople  says  of 
the  escape  of  the  Goeben  and  the  Breslau: 


Germany's  Long  Run  of  Luck      43 

I  have  often  speculated  on  what  would  have 
happened  if  the  English  battle-cruisers  which  pur- 
sued the  Breslau  and  the  Goeben  up  to  the  mouth  of 
the  Dardanelles  had  not  been  too  gentlemanly  to  vio- 
late international  law.  Suppose  they  had  entered 
the  straits,  attacked  the  German  cruisers  in  the 
Marmora,  and  sunk  them.  They  could  have  done 
this,  and,  knowing  all  that  we  know  now,  such  an 
action  would  have  been  justified.  Not  improbably 
the  destruction  would  have  kept  Turkey  out  of  the 
war.  For  the  arrival  of  these  cruisers  made  it  inevi- 
table that  Turkey,  when  the  proper  time  came,  should 
join  forces  with  Germany.  With  them  the  Turkish 
navy  became  stronger  than  the  Russian  Black  Sea 
fleet,  and  thus  made  it  certain  that  Russia  could 
make  no  attack  on  Constantinople. 

Germany  in  the  first  weeks  of  the  war  thus  was  able 
to  close  definitely  to  the  Allies  the  warm  water  route 
to  Russia.  The  preservation  of  communications  with 
Russia  was  the  primary  strategic  object  of  the  Entente. 
Could  they  keep  Turkey  neutral  or  eventually  buy, 
cajole,  or  force  her  into  opening  the  Dardanelles,  Great 
Britain,  France,  and  Russia  could  reasonably  expect  to 
defeat  Germany  and  Austria-Hungary  without  aid  from 
Italy  or  the  United  States. 

But,  like  a  pure  windfall,  Constantinople  dropped 
early  in  August,  1914,  into  German  hands.  In  the 
Sea  of  Marmora  the  two  fugitive  German  cruisers 
became  of  more  value  to  Germany  than  all  the  rest 


44     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

of  Germany's  high  seas  fleet.  They  alone  of  all 
Tirpitz's  surface  navy  were  to  prove  themselves  a 
profitable    military   investment. 

To  the  Allies,  in  191 4,  1915,  and  191 6,  possession  of 
Constantinople  would  have  more  than  offset  the  loss  of 
territory  they  had  suffered  in  Belgium  and  Northern 
France.  The  Entente  strategists  could  not  see  this 
at  first,  and  never  saw  it  clearly  enough.  They  re- 
frained from  entering  the  straits  in  1914.  The  next 
year  they  made  a  half-hearted  effort  to  enter  them  and 
failed  ingloriously,  when,  with  a  little  better  manage- 
ment, success  was  in  sight.  Germany  held  her  breath 
while  the  Dardanelles  forts  were  attacked  by  the  Allied 
fleets  in  February  and  March,  1915.  But  again  fortune 
was  more  than  liberal  to  the  Germans.  The  Gallipoli 
campaign  went  down  to  history  as  a  tragic  Allied  dis- 
aster. After  that  Bulgaria  joined  the  Central  Powers, 
Serbia  was  conquered,  and  a  free  corridor  was  opened 
through  the  Balkans  from  Berlin  to  Constantinople. 
Russia's  isolation,  except  on  the  Arctic  Ocean  side 
and  through  far-off  Vladivostok,  was  clinched  and 
Russia's  exhaustion  as  a  military  power  was  assured. 

Everywhere  in  the  Near  East  events  continued  to 
play  steadily  into  Germany's  hand.  Sir  Edward  Grey 
had  been  the  ruling  spirit  in  the  London  conferences 
which  had  tried  to  straighten  out  affairs  in  the  Balkans 


Germany's  Long  Run  of  Luck      45 

after  the  first  Balkan  War.  The  net  result  of  these 
negotiations  had  been  to  create  the  burlesque  state  of 
Albania  and  put  William  of  Wied,  a  burlesque  monarch, 
on  its  throne.  They  had  also  forced  the  second  Balkan 
War,  which  ended  with  Bulgaria's  collapse  and  the 
partition  of  Bucharest. 

Sir  Edward  Grey,  an  amiable  pacifist  and  compro- 
miser, was  completely  out  of  touch  with  the  realities 
of  Balkan  politics.  He  did  not  understand  the  fierce 
passions,  jealousies,  and  hatreds  of  the  Balkan  peoples. 
He  tried  to  deal  with  Ferdinand  of  Bulgaria  as  if 
that  worthy  were,  as  he  claimed  to  be,  a  "good 
European." 

Greece  was  an  ally  of  Serbia,  the  two  countries  having 
just  finished  a  successful  war  against  Turkey  and  a 
successful  war  against  Bulgaria.  Venizelos,  the  great- 
est of  the  statesmen  of  modern  Greece,  was  in  power 
at  Athens.  The  Allies  wanted  to  enlist  Greece  in  the 
Dardanelles  enterprise  and  offered  her  liberal  compensa- 
tions. Venizelos  was  an  ardent  friend  of  the  Entente. 
But  when  it  came  to  realizing  Greek  aid  Allied  diplo- 
macy fell  between  the  two  stools  of  Greek  ambitions 
and  Italian  ambitions.  It  also  encountered,  without 
understanding  it,  the  veiled  hostility  of  King  Con- 
stantine — a  pro-German  at  heart,  who  was  to  develop 
more  and  more  into  a  malignant  enemy  of  the  Entente 


46     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

and  as  faithful  a  tool  of  Berlin  as  was  his  former 
arch-enemy,  the  Czar  of  the  Bulgars. 

It  is  a  curious  circumstance  that  the  Allies  were  to 
suffer  enormously  in  Greece  as  well  as  in  Russia  from 
distaff  politics.  Constantine's  policy  was  shaped  by 
his  wife's  relationship  to  the  German  Kaiser.  She 
was  the  Kaiser's  sister.  So  Constantine  considered 
himself  a  Hohenzollern  by  marriage.  In  that  role 
he  did  not  scruple  to  sacrifice  the  interests  of  Greece 
on  the  family  altar. 

The  Empress  of  Russia  was  a  Hessian  princess,  and 
her  great  influence  in  the  court  at  Petrograd  kept  alive 
a  pro-German  cabal,  which  apparently  remained 
in  treasonable  communication  with  Berlin,  betrayed 
military  secrets,  and  obstructed  the  delivery  of  supplies 
to  the  armies.  In  1916,  Sturmer,  the  Russian  Prime 
Minister,  helped  to  manoeuvre  Rumania  into  declaring 
war  and  then  did  what  he  could  covertly  to  abandon 
her  to  the  Germans. 

Both  Constantine  and  the  Empress  paid  a  tardy 
penalty  for  their  perfidy.  But  their  services  to  the 
German  cause,  while  they  lasted,  were  invaluable. 
They  differed  from  Ferdinand's  and  Enver  Pasha's 
only  in  that  they  were  not  paid  for  out  of  the  great 
German  corruption  fund.  Allied  diplomacy  could 
never  have  put  the  Czarina  under  bonds  for  good  be- 


Germany's  Long  Run  of  Luck      47 

haviour.  But  it  could  have  ousted  Constantine  long 
before  it  did,  because  Greece  was  a  ward  of  France, 
Great  Britain,  and  Russia.  Greece  should  have  been 
released  long  before  191 7  for  active  service  with  the 
Entente,  with  whose  interests  those  of  the  Greek  people 
were  thoroughly  in  harmony. 

Bulgaria,  the  loser  in  the  second  Balkan  War,  still 
bitter  and  vengeful,  was  the  natural  ally  of  Germany 
and  Austria-Hungary.  But  Sir  Edward  Grey  and 
Delcasse  dealt  with  her  as  if  a  passionless  and  enlight- 
ened self-interest  could  convert  her  into  a  friend  and 
associate.  Many  powerful  British  influences  were  pro- 
Bulgar,  and  believed  that  Bulgaria,  Serbia,  Rumania, 
and  Greece  might  be  brought  to  lie  down  together  in 
concord  by  means  of  a  few  sleight-of-hand  territorial 
readjustments. 

Sir  Edward  Grey  was  dispassionate  enough  to  ask 
both  Serbia  and  Greece  to  surrender  portions  of  their 
territory  to  the  Bulgars.  Serbia  was  outraged  by  this 
suggestion.  So  was  Greece,  although  Venizelos  mag- 
nanimously agreed  to  recommend  the  sacrifice.  But 
nothing  came  of  these  ill-conceived  moves,  except  to 
put  into  Constantine's  hands  a  weapon  with  which 
to  demolish  Venizelos's  prestige. 

Bulgaria  should  have  been  forced  to  declare  her 
attitude  early  in  1 9 1 5 .     She  was  not  ready  for  war  then ; 


48     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

nor  was  Germany  ready  to  invade  Serbia.  The  Rus- 
sian armies  were  still  astride  the  Carpathians.  But 
Ferdinand  cleverly  hoodwinked  the  Allied  diplomats. 
Mackensen  and  Hindenburg  spent  the  spring  and  sum- 
mer driving  the  Russians  out  of  Galicia  and  Poland. 
In  the  fall,  when  Ferdinand  had  lifted  the  mask  and 
Serbia  was  ready  to  be  crushed,  the  Allies  could  only 
look  on  impotently. 

The  Teuton  programme  of  conquest  developed  without 
a  hitch,  so  far  as  the  Eastern  Front  was  concerned. 
There  was  something  uncanny  in  the  precision  with 
which  it  unfolded.  Fortune  smiled  everywhere  on 
German  plans,  while  the  Allies  seemed  to  touch  nothing 
except  to  bungle  it. 

In  the  West,  too,  the  Germans  profited  dispropor- 
tionately from  what  might  be  called  the  accidental 
developments  of  the  military  situation.  France  had 
prepared  a  strong  defence  of  her  eastern  frontier.  But 
the  eastern  frontier  could  be  turned  by  an  enemy 
coming  through  Belgium. 

The  French  General  Staff  had  ample  warning  of 
Germany's  purpose  to  violate  Belgian  neutrality. 
General  Bernhardi  in  Germany  and  the  Next  War,  pub- 
lished in  191 1,  had  spoken  of  a  flank  movement  across 
Belgium  as  a  matter  of  course.  Possibly  the  French 
High  Command  thought  that  this  was  merely  a  bluff 


Germany's  Long  Run  of  Luck      49 

to  distract  French  attention  from  the  defence  of  the 
Alsace-Lorraine  and  Luxemburg  front. 

At  any  rate,  Joffre  let  the  defence  of  the  northern 
frontier  go  by  the  board,  and  the  German  armies  found 
an  easy  path  up  the  valley  of  the  Meuse  and  across  the 
plain  of  Northern  France  as  far  as  the  outskirts  of 
Paris.  Thus  they  were  enabled  to  fight  the  first  great 
battle  of  the  war  far  in  the  rear  of  the  northern  frontier 
forts.  South  of  the  Marne  and  directly  east  of  Paris, 
they  were  well  behind  even  the  secondary  French 
defences,  like  the  line  of  La  Fere-Laon-Rheims.  They 
had  wrested  from  the  French  that  advantage  of  posi- 
tion which  the  latter  had  counted  on  to  neutralize  the 
German  advantage  in  numbers. 

The  Germans  committed  an  international  crime, 
gravely  damaging  to  them  in  the  larger  moral  aspect, 
when  they  violated  Belgian  neutrality.  That  crime 
made  Germany  an  outlaw  in  the  world  and  turned  all 
neutral  sympathy  away  from  her.  But  the  immediate 
results  of  the  eruption  through  Belgium  were  of  enor- 
mous military  value.  The  German  armies  obtained 
a  lodgment  on  French  soil  at  very  little  cost.  They 
secured  the  "elbow  room"  which  they  needed  and 
which  they  would  have  lacked  if  they  had  based  their 
offensive  on  Metz.  They  were  able  to  reap  at  once 
the  advantages  of  a  war  of  movement,  in  which  the 


50      The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

weight  of  their  somewhat  superior  numbers  and  com- 
pleter mechanical  equipment  had  the  best  chance  to 
make  itself  felt. 

The  German  High  Command  lost  the  first  battle 
of  the  Marne  through  overconfidence.  The  younger 
Moltke  and  all  his  lieutenants  undervalued  both  the 
French  army  and  Joffre's  leadership.  They  thought 
they  were  marching  to  another  Sedan.  Instead  they 
walked  heedlessly  into  an  ambush.  The  German 
military  temperament  disclosed  its  weaknesses  at  the 
Marne,  just  as  it  was  to  disclose  them  at  every  other 
real  crisis  of  the  war.  Complacency  at  Grand  Head- 
quarters swiftly  nullified  the  effect  of  the  really 
brilliant  initial  successes  of  the  1914  campaign. 

Germany  might  not  have  been  able  to  crush  France 
in  September,  191 4.  It  is  not  clear  that  she  would 
ever  have  been  able  to  crush  France,  even  with  the 
wisest  use  of  her  superior  resources.  But  with  a  more 
alert  and  wary  leadership  she  might  easily  have  gath- 
ered in  the  first  months  of  the  war  the  full  fruits  of  her 
almost  unopposed  march  to  Paris.  She  might  have  com- 
pelled Joffre  to  abandon  the  French  capital,  as  she  had 
already  compelled  the  Belgians  to  evacuate  Brussels. 

At  the  First  Marne  Germany  threw  away  the  hope 
of  an  imposing  victory  on  the  West  Front.  Circum- 
stances now  compelled  her  to  turn  for  victory  to  the 


Germany's  Long  Run  of  Luck       51 

East — her  natural  field  of  conquest.  She  had  success- 
fully begun  and  then  botched  her  campaign  in  the 
West  under  conditions  which  were  extremely  favourable 
to  the  offensive.  The  Allied  armies  were  painfully 
short  of  machine  guns  and  heavy  artillery.  The  power 
of  the  defensive  had  been  steadily  increasing  with  the 
perfection  of  small  arms  and  field  guns.  But  the  de- 
fensive had  not  yet  completely  found  itself.  The  big 
Skoda  and  Krupp  howitzers  had  relegated  the  old- 
fashioned  fortress  to  the  scrap-heap.  Liege,  Namur, 
and  Antwerp  fell  with  incredible  rapidity.  Almost 
overnight,  elaborate  fortifications  became  liabilities, 
instead  of  assets.  Military  opinion  was  at  sea,  finding 
many  of  its  preconceptions  of  the  value  of  the  defensive 
demolished. 

The  Marne  campaign  was  thus  fought  along  the  old 
lines  of  open  warfare.  It  was  decided  as  the  Napoleonic 
campaigns  or  the  elder  Moltke's  campaigns  were  de- 
cided— by  manoeuvring  and  by  field  operations  without 
shelter.  The  Marne  campaign  was,  in  a  sense,  a  mili- 
tary anachronism.  It  was  inevitable  that  modern 
armies  should  seek  to  protect  themselves.  If  fixed 
fortifications  above  ground  had  become  valueless  the 
troops  would  have  to  dig  in  in  the  open,  wherever 
they  were.  So  the  trench  system,  with  all  its  elabora- 
tions, was  evolved. 


52      The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

This  revolution  in  field  tactics  was  to  have  the  effect 
of  immobilizing  war  on  the  West  Front  for  the  next 
three  years.  But  the  Germans  were  to  benefit  from 
this  immobilization  much  more  largely  than  the  Allies. 
The  change  came  just  as  the  Germans  were  ready  to 
drop  the  offensive  in  the  West  and  to  go  east  to  recover 
the  territory  which  Austria-Hungary  had  lost  to  the 
Russians. 

The  deadlock  of  trench  warfare  set  in  about  Decem- 
ber, 1914.  In  the  West,  where  the  strength  of  the 
combatants  was  becoming  more  and  more  equalized, 
the  defensive  gained  enormously  in  power  over  the 
offensive.  Open  warfare  was  abolished  and  great 
battles  were  fought,  with  losses  running  into  the  tens 
of  thousands,  in  which  the  gains  of  territory  were 
measured  not  in  miles,  but  in  hundreds  of  yards. 

The  coming  of  trench  warfare  greatly  strengthened 
the  German  grip  on  France.  Having  failed  to  take 
Paris  in  September  and  the  Channel  ports  in  October 
and  November,  the  German  High  Command  settled 
down  to  a  defensive  which  lasted,  except  for  the  Verdun 
episode,  until  March,  191 8.  It  was  the  obvious  policy 
of  the  Germans  to  hold  fast  in  the  West  while  solidify- 
ing their  power  in  the  East.  They  could  do  this  with 
a  minimum  expenditure  of  effort  in  France  and  Bel- 
gium, because  of  the  vast  defence  systems  which  they 


Germany's  Long  Run  of  Luck       53 

constructed — mostly  through  the  enforced  labour  of 
prisoners.  Against  these  great  barriers  the  French 
and  British  armies  beat  for  three  years  without  making 
anything  like  a  serious  breach  in  them.  It  was  "nib- 
bling" on  a  grand  scale.  But  the  cost  was  always 
out  of  proportion  to  the  results.  The  Germans  had 
the  man  power,  the  artillery,  the  machine  guns,  and 
the  strategic  reserves  to  defend  their  Western  lines, 
and  at  the  same  time  they  had  sufficient  strength  to 
overrun  Galicia,  Poland,  Courland,  Bukowina,  Serbia, 
Montenegro,  Albania,  and  Rumania  and  to  deal  the 
finishing  blow  to  the  toppling  Russian  giant. 

There  could  be  no  genuine  deadlock  on  the  Eastern 
Front.  The  necessary  solidity  on  the  part  of  the  de- 
fence was  lacking  on  that  side.  The  enormously  supe- 
rior German  artillery  could  breach  the  enemy  lines  at 
any  point  and  then  restore  relatively  open  warfare. 
The  heaviest  Allied  artillery  concentrations  in  France 
and  Belgium  made  only  dents  here  and  there  in  the 
German  defences.  But,  relying  chiefly  on  their  heavy 
guns,  the  Germans  could  clear  hostile  territory  in  the 
East  with  almost  as  much  ease  as  in  the  days  before 
the  intervention  of  rigid  positional  warfare. 

In  still  another  important  development  of  modern 
war  fortune  was  kind  to  the  Germans.  They  had 
built   great  hopes   on   the   Zeppelin.     It   disappointed 


54     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

them;  for  the  dirigible  as  a  weapon  of  offence  was  one 
of  the  absolute  failures  of  the  war.  But  the  U-boat 
surpassed  ail  expectations.  It  was  exploited  to  an 
extent  which  revolutionized  warfare  at  sea.  It  was 
one  of  the  greatest  military  "finds"  of  the  war,  out- 
classing in  effectiveness  the  Skoda  howitzer  and  the 
fifty-mile  super-cannon,  and  almost  rivalling  in  de- 
structiveness  the  bombing  airplane. 

Within  a  week  from  the  outbreak  of  hostilities  the 
German  navy  was  practically  driven  from  the  ocean. 
The  high  sea  fleet  was  interned  at  the  German  naval 
bases,  issuing  infrequently  on  raids  and  only  twice 
venturing  a  real  engagement  with  the  British.  The 
Asiatic  squadron  remained  at  large  in  the  Pacific  for 
several  months,  defeating  an  inferior  British  squadron 
off  the  Chilean  coast,  and  subsequently,  after  entering 
the  South  Atlantic,  being  itself  destroyed  by  a  superior 
British  squadron  off  the  Falkland  Islands.  A  few 
remaining  light  cruisers,  including  the  famous  Emden, 
were  gradually  rounded  up  in  the  ends  of  the  earth. 

German  sea  power  seemed  to  have  vanished.  But 
what  the  German  cruiser  could  no  longer  do  on  the 
surface  of  the  waters  the  U-boat  quickly  learned  to  do 
under  them.  Before  the  war  the  U-boat  was  merely 
a  promising  experiment.  Few  naval  authorities  had 
much  faith  in  its  future.     It  was  constructed  primarily 


Germany's  Long  Run  of  Luck      55 

as  an  engine  of  coast  defence,  supplementing  mines 
and  land  batteries.  The  cruising  radius  of  most  of 
the  submarines  built  before  1914  was  small,  and  the 
speed  attained,  either  on  the  surface  or  under  it,  was 
so  low  that  the  U-boat  seemed  condemned  to  operate 
within  a  narrow  range  along  the  coasts  which  it  protected. 

Admiral  Sir  Percy  Scott  was  the  only  British  expert 
with  imagination  enough  to  realize  the  great  offensive 
power  bottled  up  in  the  submarine.  Just  before  the 
war  he  wrote  some  articles  in  the  London  Times  in 
which  he  predicted  that  if  war  came  battleships  would 
have  to  be  locked  up  in  harbours  behind  booms  to  pre- 
vent their  being  torpedoed  by  U-boats.  He  believed 
that  the  spirit  of  invention,  which  is  mothered  by 
necessity,  would,  under  war  conditions,  soon  make 
the  submarine  seaworthy  and  enormously  dangerous, 
just  as  the  Monitor  and  the  ironclad  Merrimac  sprang 
suddenly  into  being  in  the  American  Civil  War. 

Sir  Percy  Scott  was  laughed  at  by  the  naval  bureau- 
crats. But  he  was  right.  Within  two  or  three  years 
he  saw  the  British  battleships  shepherded  in  bays  of 
refuge  about  the  Northern  Scottish  Islands,  whence 
they  issued  only  under  the  closest  guard  of  sweepers 
and  destroyers.  But  in  his  wildest  speculations  he 
had  never  prophesied  the  development  of  a  U-boat 
which    should   carry   6-inch   guns   for   surface   fighting 


56     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

purposes  and  should  not  only  patrol  the  British  Isles 
and  the  coasts  of  France  and  Spain  but  should  cross 
and  recross  the  Atlantic  with  ease.  That  a  submarine 
with  a  base  at  Kiel  or  Wilhelmshaven  should  sink 
merchant  ships  off  Barnegat  Bay  or  the  Virginia  Capes 
seemed  as  incredible  in  1914  as  that  German  coast 
guns  should  bombard  Edinburgh  or  London. 

Germany,  therefore,  found  herself  possessed  in  the 
U-boat  of  more  than  an  equivalent  in  offensive  sea 
power  for  what  she  had  lost  in  her  marooned  surface 
navy.  Until  experience  began  to  furnish  the  enemy 
surface  fleets  with  an  adequate  defence  the  submarine 
made  life  miserable  for  them.  The  appearance  of  a 
single  U-boat  in  the  ^Egean  Sea  in  the  summer  of  191 5 
compelled  the  withdrawal  of  the  Allied  warships  which 
were  co-operating  in  the  Gallipoli  campaign.  From 
1915  to  1918  Allied  operations  in  the  Near  East  were 
greatly  hampered  by  the  submarine  threat.  French 
and  British  military  effort  was  thereby  localized  to 
Belgium  and  France,  where  Germany  needed  most 
to  localize  it.  The  incidental  warfare  on  Allied  ship- 
ping was  also  a  grave  strain  on  Allied  commerce  and 
transportation. 

Germany  could  have  conformed  her  U-boat  activi- 
ties to  the  accepted  rules  of  warfare  at  sea  and  still 
have  derived  an  immense  advantage  from  them.     She 


Germany's  Long  Run  of  Luck      57 

did,  in  fact,  live  up,  pretty  closely,  to  the  international 
code  in  her  campaign  of  191 8  against  shipping  on  the 
American  coast.  But  the  spirit  of  excess  and  fright- 
fulness  was  in  her  blood.  Because  Great  Britain  set 
up  a  cruiser  cordon  blockade,  which  infringed  on  exist- 
ing neutral  property  rights,  Germany  tried  to  set  up 
a  "submarine  blockade,"  which  abolished  the  safe- 
guards hitherto  thrown  about  the  lives  of  neutrals  and 
non-combatants. 

Yet  even  in  this  misguided  venture  fortune  was  still 
constant  to  the  Kaiser.  The  sinking  of  the  Lusitania 
on  May  7,  191 5,  ought  to  have  led  promptly  to  war 
with  the  United  States.  The  American  Government 
had  stated  its  position  in  the  note  of  warning  sent  to 
Berlin  on  February  12,  191 5.  But  when  the  Kaiser 
did  what  he  had  been  told  he  would  be  held  to  "strict 
accountability"  for  doing  and  refused  to  disavow  his 
crime,  the  United  States  Government  not  only  avoided 
declaring  war,  but  ostentatiously  refused  to  prepare 
for  war.  A  gigantic  blunder  in  German  military  policy 
brought  no  evil  consequences.  On  the  contrary,  it 
helped  Germany  to  intimidate  the  other  maritime 
neutrals;  for  Holland,  Spain,  and  the  Scandinavian 
states  could  not  be  expected  to  break  with  Berlin  on 
an  issue  which  had  not  caused  a  severance  of  relations 
between  Berlin  and  Washington. 


58     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Iniquity,  so  long  as  it  was  German  iniquity,  seemed  to 
wax  and  prosper.  For  two  years  American  complacency 
and  unpreparedness  continued.  We  were  "kept  out  of 
war."  And  we  should  probably  have  been  "kept  out  of 
war"  to  the  end  if  German  folly,  aggravated  by  too  easy 
prosperity,  had  not  finally  resolved  to  treat  the  United 
States  as  a  practically  negligible  military  quantity. 

This  was  the  monumental  blunder  of  German  strat- 
egy. The  United  States  was,  in  fact,  capable  of  being 
converted  within  a  short  time  into  the  most  powerful 
military  nation  in  the  world.  But  the  infatuated 
German  High  Command  couldn't  see  that.  A  com- 
petent general  staff  should  have  known  that  the  unre- 
stricted submarine  campaign  was,  from  the  military 
point  of  view,  only  a  piece  of  window  dressing.  It 
could  not  bring  victory.  And  dragging  the  United 
States  by  the  ears  into  the  war  was  bound  to  make 
victory  for  Germany  impossible. 

Germany  had  the  war  nearly  won  in  January,  191 7. 
Her  long  streak  of  good  fortune  was  about  to  culminate 
in  the  Russian  revolution.  But  she  was  drunk  with 
success.  She  forgot  caution.  She  sacrificed  substance 
to  shadow.  Less  than  ever  did  she  comprehend  the 
world  about  her  or  the  true  objects  of  her  own  strategy. 
She  could  no  longer  understand  the  great  poet  of  her 
era  of  intellectual  clarity  and  modesty : 


Germany's  Long  Run  of  Luck      59 

Nicht  einen  sah  ich  frohlich  enden 
A  uf  den  mit  immer  vollen  Hdnden 
Die  Cotter  ihre  Gaben  streuen. 

[I  never  saw  any  one  come  to  a  happy  end  on  whom 
the  gods  showered  their  gifts  from  heaped-up  hands.] 

Germany  should  have  sent  to  the  madhouse  the 
leaders,  who  wanted,  in  the  winter  of  191 6-17,  to  run 
amuck  with  the  submarine.  Instead,  she  acclaimed 
them  as  military  geniuses — thus  writing  her  own  doom. 


CHAPTER  IV 


SEA   POWER   IN   THE   WAR 


Sea  power  did  not  win  the  World  War.  Yet  the 
misuse  of  sea  power  lost  it.  This  is  a  paradox  which 
has  troubled  the  extreme  partisans  of  the  Mahan  theory. 
Mahan's  contentions  were  vindicated,  but  in  an  inverse 
sense. 

Sea  power  such  as  Germany  had  proved  a  mill- 
stone around  her  neck.  It  confused  her  strategy.  It 
tempted  her  away  from  her  safe  and  natural  field  of 
military  effort.  The  continent  of  Europe  was  her 
true  terrain,  just  as  it  was  Napoleon's.  Speaking 
broadly,  she  would  have  been  better  off  in  a  military 
sense  if  she  had  had  no  navy. 

"Germany's  future  lies  on  the  sea,"  said  William  II 
in  one  of  his  expansive  and  vainglorious  moments. 
No  prophecy  could  have  been  more  inept.  No  policy 
could  be  more  dangerous  for  Germany  than  one  which 
committed  her  to  an  effort  to  challenge  Great  Britain's 
mastery  of  the  ocean.  Germany's  geographical  posi- 
tion was  an  ideal  one  for  conquests  on  land — for  terri- 

60 


Sea  Power  in  the  War  61 

tonal  expansion  east  and  south.     But  it  was  almost 
prohibitive  of  sea  empire. 

Germany  had  risen  to  the  status  of  the  first  military 
power  in  Europe  without  the  aid  of  a  navy.  Bismarck, 
Moltke,  and  the  generation  which  vanquished  Austria 
and  France  and  created  the  Empire  would  not  have 
known  what  to  do  with  a  high  seas  fleet.  They  would 
have  looked  on  it  as  a  superfluity  and  an  encumbrance. 

The  illusion  of  German  sea  power  took  root  in  the 
brains  of  the  post-Bismarckians.  The  Great  Chancel- 
lor always  trod  the  solid  ground.  He  cared  nothing 
for  oversea  colonies.  He  encouraged  France  to  go 
into  Tunis  in  1881.  He  was  glad  to  see  the  French 
committed  to  a  policy  of  colonial  expansion  in  Northern 
Africa.  He  believed  that  the  acquisition  of  Tunis 
would  help  to  reconcile  France  to  the  loss  of  Alsace- 
Lorraine.  He  also  foresaw  that  the  extension  of  French 
power  on  the  southern  coast  of  the  Mediterranean 
would  incense  Italy  and  drive  her  into  an  alliance  with 
Germany  and  Austria-Hungary.  But  for  himself  he 
coveted  no  colonial  establishments— no  "place  in  the 
sun"  for  Germany  beyond  the  limits  of  the  European 
continent. 

William  II  brusquely  elbowed  Bismarck  off  the 
stage  and  broke  melodramatically  with  all  the  Bis- 
marckian  traditions.     With  a  showman's  instincts  he 


62     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

turned  to  new  ideas  of  imperial  policy.  Sea  power  was 
one  of  these.  Germany  was  to  enter  the  race  for  over- 
seas trade  and  dominions.  She  was  to  have  a  great 
merchant  marine,  a  great  navy,  and  new  found  African 
and  Asiatic  colonies. 

German  industry,  making  enormous  strides  under  the 
protection  of  a  semi-socialized  government,  responded 
eagerly  to  the  new  foreign  programme.  Germany,  pro- 
ducing cheaply,  had  goods  to  sell,  and  a  subsidized 
German  merchant  marine  sprang  up  to  carry  them  to 
all  parts  of  the  world.  Dependencies  were  acquired  in 
regions  not  yet  pre-empted  by  other  colonizing  powers. 
The  German  flag  was  raised  over  the  Cameroons, 
German  West  Africa,  Togoland,  German  East  Africa, 
New  Guinea,  Samoa,  Kiaochau,  and  the  Marshall 
Islands.  France  was  badgered  into  surrendering  a 
part  of  French  West  Africa  in  return  for  a  quitclaim 
in  Morocco.  The  creation  of  a  modern  navy  paralleled 
the  rapid  and  profitable  development  of  the  two  great 
German  sea  transportation  companies — the  Hamburg- 
American  and  North  German  Lloyd. 

What  the  Kaiser  arid  his  advisers  could  not  see  was 
that  overseas  expansion  ran  counter  to  true  German 
military  policy.  If  Germany  was  going  to  pursue  the 
Prussian  tradition  of  military  conquest,  her  energies 
should  have  been  concentrated  for  use  along  the  lines 


Sea  Power  in  the  War  63 

of  least  resistance.  Her  natural  enemies  were  France 
and  Russia.  Eastern  and  Middle  Europe  were  marked 
out  by  nature  for  Teuton  exploitation.  To  seek  power 
and  territory  beyond  the  seas  was  only  to  give  un- 
necessary hostages  to  fortune.  For  Germany  could  not 
expect  to  become  a  great  colonizing  nation,  to  maintain 
a  world-wide  carrying  trade,  and,  above  all,  to  build 
a  first  class  navy,  without  exciting  the  distrust  and 
hostility  of  Great  Britain.  And  in  a  European  war 
in  which  Great  Britain  sided  with  Germany's  enemies 
the  latter's  colonies  would  fall,  her  foreign  trade  would 
be  suppressed,  and  her  navy  would  be  either  blockaded 
or  extinguished. 

Oversea  expansion  could  not  but  weaken  Germany's 
military  position.  It  necessarily  introduced  and  stimu- 
lated pacifist  tendencies  within  a  militaristic  state. 
The  more  intelligent  and  practical  leaders  in  the  up- 
building of  the  German  merchant  marine  could  not 
but  realize  that  Germany's  future  on  the  seas  depended 
absolutely  on  the  retention  of  British  goodwill  and  on 
the  preservation  of  peace. 

In  a  letter  written  in  December,  1917,  by  Albert 
Ballin,  of  the  Hamburg-American  Company,  the  great- 
est figure  in  the  German  shipping  world,  to  Dr.  Rathe- 
nau,  the  president  of  the  General  Electric  Company 
and  one  of  the  leading  German  industrialists,  a  candid 


64     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

admission  is  made  of  the  complete  dependence  of  Ger- 
man overseas  trade  before  the  war  on  the  favour  of 
Great  Britain.  Says  Mr.  Ballin,  who  died  just  before 
the  end  of  the  war,  having  first  lost  the  favour  of  his 
former  friend  and  patron,  the  Kaiser: 

More  than  ever  I  must  admit  that  every  increase 
in  our  wealth,  every  success  of  our  enterprises  in  the 
years  preceding  the  war,  were  due  to  our  relations 
with  the  British  Empire.  Its  ports,  its  dominions, 
and  its  colonies  were  largely  opened  to  our  fleets 
and  our  merchants.  I  have  often  been  astonished 
at  that  generosity,  which  I  even  regarded  as  folly. 
Can  one  suppose  that  we  shall  ever  restore  those 
old  relations?  .   .   . 

We  aspire  to  recover  our  overseas  commerce. 
On  that  prospect  we  build  the  fondest  hopes.  But 
how  can  we  recover  it  in  the  face  of  Anglo-Saxon 
unity,  which  hates,  and  ought  to  hate,  our  very 
presence?  Do  our  imbeciles  of  chauvinists  take 
account  of  the  fact  that  we  haven't  even  a  port 
where  our  ships  can  dock  or  where  they  can  receive 
a  friendly  greeting? 

Dover,  Falmouth,  and  Southampton,  Gibraltar, 
Malta,  and  Alexandria,  Aden,  the  Persian  Gulf, 
Bombay,  Colombo,  Singapore,  and  Hongkong — what 
are  they?  English  arsenals,  naval  bases,  coaling 
stations,  docks  where  we  shall  not  even  dare  to  show 
our  faces,  if  England  forbids  us  to  do  so. 

It  is  the  same  all  around  the  continent  of  Africa. 
It  is  the  same  in  the  West  Indies.  It  is  the  same  in 
the  Pacific.  We  have  not  a  single  coaling  station, 
not  a  single  dock,  where  we  can  repair  our  vessels. 


Sea  Power  in  the  War  65 

Ballin  realized — long  after  it  was  too  late — that 
German  sea  power  had  been  only  a  peace-time  fiction 
—a  matter  of  indulgence  on  the  part  of  Great  Britain. 
The  British  were  exceedingly  tolerant  of  German 
rivalry.  This  "folly,"  as  Ballin  called  it,  was  not  due 
to  any  real  consideration  for  Germany.  It  was  only 
a  phase  of  British  self-complacency.  The  average 
British  merchant  had  no  aversion  to  using  German 
freight  carriers.  He  was  willing  to  buy  cheaper  Ger- 
man goods  and  sell  them  at  home  and  abroad  under 
his  own  labels.  There  was  no  consciousness  at  all  in 
Great  Britain  of  a  "German  peril."  The  British  pub- 
lic still  put  implicit  faith  in  the  diplomacy  of  Beacons- 
field,  the  cardinal  principle  of  which  was  to  combat 
the  influence  and  ambitions  of  Russia.  German 
ambitions  were  not  taken  seriously. 

The  self-deception  of  many  British  statesmen  about 
German  purposes  was  extraordinary.  Even  down  to 
August,  1 91 4,  leaders  like  Lord  Haldane  and  Sir  Ed- 
ward Grey  seemed  unable  to  imagine  that  Germany 
would  not  only  provoke  a  European  war,  but  would 
draw  Great  Britain  into  it.  It  was  because  of  this 
singular  fatuity  that  the  British  had  to  enter  the  war 
so  deplorably  unprepared. 

The  Kaiser  and  his  advisers  may  have  had  some 
cause  to  think  that  British  politicians  would  continue 


66     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

complacent  while  Germany  was  building  up  a  power- 
ful navy  in  addition  to  a  prosperous  merchant  marine. 
But  they  misread  history  and  misjudged  the  British 
character  when  they  assumed  that  Great  Britain  would 
ever  tolerate  the  use  of  the  German  navy  to  destroy 
the  French  fleet  and  to  seize  the  French  Channel  ports. 
Such  a  challenge  to  their  own  naval  superiority  in 
Western  European  waters  the  British  people  would 
certainly  meet,  whatever  their  pacifist  politicians 
thought.  So  the  creation  of  a  German  navy  strong 
enough  to  destroy  French  sea  power  inevitably  paved 
the  way  to  war  with  Great  Britain. 

If  Germany  intended  to  be  a  real  sea  power  she  would 
therefore  have  to  count  on  locking  horns,  sooner  or 
later,  with  the  British.  The  officers  of  the  German 
fleet  knew  this.  They  had  their  toast,  "Der  Tag," 
meaning  the  day  when  they  expected  to  take  Great 
Britain's  measure  on  the  seas.  That  sort  of  thing  was 
magnificently  impudent.  But  it  was  not  war.  A  com- 
petent general  staff  would  have  vetoed  as  fantastic 
and  suicidal  the  proposition  to  take  on  Great  Britain 
as  an  additional  enemy.  And  such  a  veto  should 
have  stood,  whatever  its  effect  on  the  Kaiser's  inflated 
naval  and  colonial  programme. 

But  after  the  elder  Moltke's  death  German  military 
policy  became  confused  and  unstable.     The  Kaiser's 


Sea  Power  in  the  War  67 

erratic  influence  was  all-pervasive.  He  was  an  enthu- 
siastic yachtsman.  He  was  a  big  stockholder  in  the 
Hamburg-American  and  North  German  Lloyd  com- 
panies. He  wanted  to  create  a  tinsel  colonial  empire. 
He  was  eager  to  pose  as  war  lord  on  the  quarter-decks 
of  battleships  as  well  as  at  the  head  of  divisions  and 
armies.  There  is  nothing  to  show  that  the  General 
Staff  tried  seriously  to  dissuade  him  from  his  mad 
adventure  on  the  high  seas — an  adventure  which  could 
only  dissipate  German  resources  and  weaken  Germany's 
highly  advantageous  military  position. 

The  military  leaders  humoured  the  whims  of  the  All 
Highest,  whether  from  choice  or  from  necessity. 

Within  the  High  Command,  as  within  every  other 
governmental  body,  there  was  no  true  liberty  of 
opinion.  Only  as  late  as  191 7  did  German  military 
experts  begin  to  feel  a  little  freedom  in  discussing  the 
gigantic  blunder  of  German  naval  policy.  In  his 
Deductions  from  the  World  War,  published  in  that  year 
of  German  military  good  fortune,  Lieutenant- General 
Baron  Freytag-Loringhoven,  deputy  chief  of  the  Ger- 
man General  Staff,  indulges  in  these  cautiously  sceptical 
reflections : 

This  is  not  the  place  to  examine  how  far,  in  view 
of  the  all  too  rapid  growth  of  her  trade,  world  poli- 
tics and  world  economics  may  have  been  premature 


68     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

in  the  case  of  Germany,  inasmuch  as  our  continental 
position  was  still  by  no  means  assured.  Here 
Rancke's  words  are  applicable:  "Who  can  control 
circumstances,  calculate  future  events,  govern  the 
surging  of  the  elements?" 

This  is  a  veiled  way  of  saying  that  William  II's 
venture  in  sea  power  was  a  disastrous  misjudgment. 
Freytag-Loringhoven  also  says: 

As  the  result  of  our  geographical  position  it  will 
always  remain  our  task  to  form  a  just  estimate  of 
the  opposing  demands  of  world  economics  in  the 
narrower  sense  and  of  oversea  and  continental 
politics. 

But  this  author,  characteristically  obsequious,  diplo- 
matically gilds  the  pill  by  adding: 

The  World  War  affords  incontrovertible  proof 
that  Germany  must  for  all  time  to  come  maintain 
her  claim  to  sea  power.  We  need  not  at  present 
discuss  by  what  means  this  aim  is  to  be  achieved. 

Empty  and  melancholy  words!  Hardly  more  than 
a  year  after  they  were  written  the  greater  part  of  the 
German  high  seas  fleet  was  steaming  across  the  North 
Sea  to  surrender  to  the  Allies,  and  the  German  U-boats, 
the  only  units  in  the  German  navy  which  were  able 
to  keep  the  seas  and  to  inflict  real  losses  on  the  enemy, 
were  being  turned  over  en  masse  to  the  victors.     The 


Sea  Power  in  the  War  69 

German  navy  struck  its  flag  in  November,  1918,  with- 
out even  fighting  to  save  appearances.  It  was  a  fitting 
end  to  a  preposterous  military  experiment. 

But  no  one  in  Germany  ever  foresaw  the  tragic 
ceremony  off  the  Firth  of  Forth.  The  strategists  of  the 
General  Staff,  who  should  have  subordinated  every- 
thing to  securing  Germany's  Continental  position,  were 
silent  while  Admiral  Tirpitz  pursued  for  two  decades 
or  more  his  task  of  fitting  Germany  for  that  "future" 
on  the  seas  of  which  William  II  had  boasted. 

Tirpitz  was,  in  a  military  sense,  Germany's  chief 
evil  genius.  A  promoter  and  politician  rather  than  a 
seaman,  he  worked  for  his  own  glorification  and  that 
of  his  caste.  He  won  the  confidence  of  the  pan-Germans 
and  the  Junkers  who  saw  in  his  schemes  only  another 
easy  way  of  boosting  German  military  expenditures. 
He  spent  millions  of  marks  organizing  navy  leagues  in 
the  interior  of  the  empire  and  carrying  back-district 
delegations  to  Hamburg  and  Bremen,  where  they  were 
feted  and  infected  with  the  big  navy  propaganda. 
He  had  the  support  of  the  big  industrials  and  the  ex- 
porting interests  and  became  in  time  one  of  the  "un- 
crowned kings"  of  the  Prussian  state,  like  Krupp, 
Thyssen,  Heydebrand,  Ballin,  and  Rathenau. 

Opinionated,  imperious,  and  fertile  in  intrigue,  he 
bestrode    Germany    like      an    uncouth    colossus.     A 


7°     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

neutral  traveller  gave  this  glimpse  of  him  in  the  latter 
part  of  the  war.  A  train  overcrowded  with  women, 
children,  and  wounded  soldiers  is  travelling  from  one 
German  town  to  another.  The  disabled  and  suffering 
pack  the  compartments  and  the  aisles.  At  one  stop- 
ping place  a  spacious,  locked  compartment  is  opened 
and  Tirpitz  issues  alone — obese,  whiskered,  gorgeously 
uniformed,  and  haughtily  rigid.  What  was  the  comfort 
of  any  one  else  on  that  train  compared  with  his  comfort  ? 

Tirpitz  had  his  secret  naval  appropriations  and  his 
secret  building  programme.  But  there  are  no  inviolable 
secrets  in  a  matter  like  naval  construction.  The 
German  navy,  as  planned  by  him,  was  soon  to  overtake 
and  pass  every  other  navy,  except  Great  Britain's. 
The  British  Government  remained  apathetic  for  a 
long  time.  But  the  point  was  eventually  reached 
when  the  British  standard  of  naval  superiority — a  fleet 
equal  to  that  of  any  two  other  powers — was  threatened 
by  German  construction. 

Great  Britain  finally  protested  and  began  negotia- 
tions with  Germany  for  a  mutual  limitation  of  build- 
ing programmes.  The  German  Admiralty  backed  and 
filled,  professing  innocence  of  any  intention  to  challenge 
British  sea  power.  But  no  limitation  agreement  was 
ever  reached.  Thereafter  Great  Britain  and  Germany 
became    potential     enemies.     However    tinged     with 


Sea  Power  in  the  War  71 

pacifism  the  Asquith-Haldane-Grey  government  might 
be,  however  slight  attention  it  might  pay  to  Lord 
Roberts's  appeals  for  military  preparation,  British 
distrust  of  German  naval  ambitions  had  been  aroused. 
Tirpitz  had  made  it  impossible  for  Great  Britain  to  re- 
main a  spectator  in  any  European  war  which  Germany 
should  precipitate. 

German  indignation  when  Great  Britain  joined 
France  and  Russia  in  19 14  was  therefore  petulant 
and  insincere.  The  violation  of  Belgian  neutrality  fur- 
nished the  Asquith  government  with  a  welcome  moral 
issue  on  which  to  reverse  its  own  policy  of  sluggish 
non-concern.  Yet  even  without  the  Belgian  perfidy 
Great  Britain  would  have  been  obliged  to  enter  the 
war.  Her  own  security  compelled  her  to  accept  the 
opportunity  offered  to  end  the  growing  menace  of 
German  naval  power. 

But  Tirpitz  was  to  involve  Germany  in  still  more 
costly  military  blunders.  His  surface  fleet  was  swept 
from  the  ocean  in  the  first  months  of  the  war.  He 
found  accidentally  in  the  submarine  an  offensive  weapon 
worth  vastly  more  than  his  battleships  and  cruisers. 
Yet  the  use  he  made  of  the  U-boat  was  senseless  and 
disastrous.  Smarting  at  the  failure  of  his  surface 
vessels  to  hold  the  seas,  he  resolved  to  drive  all  other 
surface  shipping  off  them.     It  was  a  grandiose  idea. 


72     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Had  Tirpitz  succeeded  he  would  have  won  the  war. 
He  would  have  won  the  war  equally  if  he  had  been 
able  to  carry  through  his  original  plan  to  create  a  sur- 
face navy  strong  enough  to  cope  with  Great  Britain's. 

But  both  these  ideas  were  phantasms.  And  the 
failure  to  realize  the  second  entailed  more  fatal  con- 
sequences than  the  failure  to  realize  the  first.  Germany 
still  had  a  chance  to  win  a  European  war  after  Great 
Britain  had  joined  France  and  Russia.  But  she  had 
no  chance  at  all  to  win  a  world  war  into  which  she  had 
dogged  the  United  States  by  persisting  in  her  unre- 
stricted U-boat  operations.  Tirpitz  had  his  sufficient 
warning  of  the  perils  of  high  sea  murder  when  he  sank 
the  Lusitania  and  raised  a  moral  and  legal  issue  with  the 
United  States.  But  nothing  could  deter  him.  He  had 
become  more  than  ever  a  visionary  and  a  gambler. 
So,  after  contemptuously  parleying  for  nearly  two 
years  with  Washington,  he  began  a  war  of  piracy  against 
all  neutral  shipping.  This  madness  arrayed  against 
Germany  a  power  even  more  formidable  than  Great 
Britain.  When  reluctant  America  was  converted 
into  a  belligerent  Germany's  last  chance  of  victory 
disappeared. 

The  German  public  was  slow  to  recognize  the  fatal 
effects  of  Tirpitz's  naval  policy.  But  long  before  the 
end  of  the  war  the  Kaiser  found  it  advisable  to  make  a 


Sea  Power  in  the  War  73 

show  of  sacrificing  him  to  popular  discontent.  He 
was  sidetracked,  though  the  continuing  effects  of  his 
blunders  could  not  be  sidetracked. 

Even  naval  officers  and  critics  turned  against  him. 
Captain  Persius  was  the  fairest  and  most  competent 
of  the  German  writers  on  naval  affairs.  He  had  been 
a  booster  of  the  big  navy  idea  and  of  unrestricted  sub- 
marine warfare.  But  he  was  finally  disillusioned 
enough  to  write  in  the  Berliner  Tageblatt: 

Herr  von  Tirpitz  may  be  assured  that  all  attempts 
to  cover  over  his  guilt  will  miserably  fail.  The 
German  people  will  some  day  have  a  clear  under- 
standing of  the  situation,  and  then  it  will  realize 
that  the  phrase  which  Kammerherr  von  Oldenberg- 
Janutschau  used  with  reference  to  Herr  von  Beth- 
mann-Hollweg  applies  still  better  to  Herr  von  Tirpitz : 
"I  believe  that  never  has  a  minister  done  his  country 
a  graver  injury  than  he." 

Germany  lost  the  war,  therefore,  because  she  had 
handicapped  herself  with  naval  power  and  then  misem- 
ployed it.  Had  she  had  no  navy  or  only  a  moderate 
sized  coast  defence  navy  she  might  not  have  had  to 
fight  Great  Britain  at  all.  She  certainly  would  never 
have  had  to  fight  the  United  States.,  And  since  her 
true  field  of  conquest  was  in  Eastern  and  South-eastern 
Europe,  the  lack  of  a  navy  could  have  made  no  differ- 
ence whatever  in  her  offensive  strength. 


74      The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Her  case  fell  outside  the  scope  of  Admiral  Mahan's 
theory  that  sea  power  is  the  necessary  adjunct  of 
empire.  She  needed  merely  enough  warships  to  keep 
control  of  the  Baltic  and  to  assist  her  land  operations 
against  the  Baltic  provinces,  Finland,  and  the  Petrograd 
district.  The  Baltic  was  closed  by  mines  against  the 
British  fleet.  The  Black  Sea  was  closed  by  the 
Dardanelles  forts.  Germany  could  therefore  proceed  in 
the  East  without  any  fear  of  hostile  interference  from 
Allied  sea  power. 

Many  writers  have  asserted  that  Allied  sea  power 
defeated  Germany.  But  this  claim  entirely  overlooks 
what  the  Germans  went  out  of  their  way  to  do  to 
defeat  themselves.  It  is  true  that  control  of  the  sea 
made  possible  the  transportation  of  the  American 
armies  to  France;  and  American  man  power  turned 
the  scale  in  land  fighting  against  Germany.  But 
Germany  would  never  have  been  obliged  to  fight  the 
United  States  if  she  had  had  the  sagacity  to  pursue 
a  military  policy  dictated  by  her  own  strategical 
necessities  and  limitations. 

The  blockade,  conducted  with  ever-increasing  rigour, 
greatly  hampered  the  Teuton  allies.  But  they  had 
no  reason  to  expect  anything  different.  And  they  were 
in  nothing  like  the  desperate  situation  in  which  the 
Confederate   States   found   themselves   from    1861    to 


Sea  Power  in  the  War  75 

1865.  Germany  was  self-supporting,  so  far  as  the 
manufacture  of  war  material  was  concerned.  She 
had  enough  for  her  purposes.  There  was  a  shortage 
in  food  after  191 5.  But  the  Teuton  peoples  were 
never  near  the  starvation  point.  The  armies  were 
always  sufficiently  supplied  and  lost  nothing  in  fighting 
power  by  reason  of  shortened  rations.  And  Germany 
constantly  extended  her  territorial  conquests,  finally 
getting  possession  of  the  rich  grain  lands  of  Rumania 
and  the  Ukraine. 

Reports  of  alarming  food  shortages  in  the  Central 
States  filled  the  Allied  press  ini9i5,  1916,  and  191 7. 
They  were  gross  exaggerations,  intended  to  keep  up 
the  spirit  of  the  Allied  publics.  After  191 7  readers 
ceased  to  put  any  faith  in  them.  Hunger  would  not 
have  brought  Germany  to  her  knees  in  the  fall  of  191 8 
or  broken  the  Teuton  coalition  if  American  man  power 
had  not  arrived  in  Europe  and  the  German  armies 
had  not  been  decisively  beaten  in  Champagne,  Picardy, 
Artois,  and  Flanders. 

The  Allied  blockade  failed  to  starve  Germany  into 
submission,  although  it  caused  the  enemy  much  an- 
noyance and  discomfort.  Allied  sea  power  was  also 
unequal  in  preventing  the  attainment  of  what  should 
have  been  Germany's  primary  strategical  aim.  That 
was  the  conquest  and  absorption  of  Russia. 


76     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

The  Allied  fleets  faltered  at  the  Dardanelles  in  March, 
191 5.  The  Black  Sea  was  never  entered  by  French  and 
British  warships  until  after  the  armistice  was  signed. 

Control  of  the  sea  enabled  the  Allies  to  deliver  war 
material  to  the  Russian  armies  through  Kola,  Arch- 
angel, and  Vladivostok.  But  the  difficulties  of  land 
transportation  from  these  ports  to  the  eastern  fighting 
front  had  still  to  be  overcome.  They  were  success- 
fully overcome  only  for  a  short  period  in  191 6. 

Freytag-Loringhoven  says  very  justly  of  the  military 
effects  of  the  blockade : 

The  consequences  of  the  blockade  to  which  the 
Central  Powers  were  subjected  made  themselves 
felt  at  once.  Although  we  have  succeeded  by  our 
own  might  in  developing  and  carrying  on  our 
economic  life  during  the  war,  none  the  less  the  dis- 
advantages of  our  economic  position  in  the  world 
have  made  themselves  felt  all  the  time.  They  alone 
explain  the  fact  that  new  opportunities  of  resistance 
constantly  revealed  themselves  to  our  opponents  be- 
cause the  sea  was  open  to  them,  and  that  victories 
which  formerly  would  have  been  absolutely  decisive 
and  the  conquest  of  whole  kingdoms  still  brought  us 
no  nearer  to  peace.  Thus  was  Russia  able  to  recover 
from  the  severe  defeats  of  the  summer  of  191 5,  and 
to  attack  once  more  in  the  following  year  with  newly 
equipped  armies. 

But  Brusiloff's  Galician  offensive  of  191 6  was  the 
last  flash  in  the  pan  of  Russian  fighting  power.     Allied 


Sea  Power  in  the  War  77 

control  of  the  sea  could  not  check  Russian  disintegra- 
tion. It  could  not  prevent  the  elimination  of  Russia 
as  a  belligerent.  And  to  hold  Russia  in  line  was  the 
chief  aim  of  Entente  strategy,  until  the  United  States 
came  in  to  replace  Russia.  Sea  power  was  an  impor- 
tant contributing  element  to  Allied  strength.  But  it 
could  never  have  decided  the  war  in  the  Entente's 
favour  if  the  war  had  retained  its  strictly  European 
character. 

The  development  of  the  submarine  greatly  compli- 
cated the  problem  of  the  sea  strategists.  They  brought 
their  influence  to  bear  at  the  Paris  peace  conference 
to  have  a  ban  put  on  the  use  of  the  U-boats.  But  it 
would  be  just  as  reasonable  to  put  a  prohibition  on  the 
use  of  long  distance  guns  of  the  "Big  Bertha"  type,  or 
of  bombing  airplanes.  All  these  instruments  of  destruc- 
tion render  more  or  less  precarious  the  guarantees 
thrown  about  the  lives  of  non-combatants  by  the  rules 
of  civilized  war  as  they  existed  before  1914.  But  the 
character  of  war  itself  has  changed.  It  has  become 
more  terrible.  It  has  now  been  so  intensified  as  to 
obscure  the  old  distinctions  between  combatants  and 
non-combatants.  Armies  no  longer  fight  armies; 
nations  fight  nations. 

If  wars  are  to  continue  it  would  be  against  human 
nature  and  against  all  military  experience  to  expect 


78     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

belligerents  to  forego  the  use  of  any  of  the  means  of 
destroying  the  power  of  the  enemy  which  this  war  has 
developed.  So  the  U-boats,  banned  or  not,  will  un- 
doubtedly remain  a  potentially  disturbing  factor  in  naval 
warfare.  The  war's  effects  on  sea  power  were  in  a 
sense  more  revolutionary  than  its  effects  on  land  power. 
The  weaker  sea  powers  were  benefited,  relatively,  at 
the  expense  of  the  stronger. 

But  Germany  entered  the  war  with  no  clear  idea  of 
using  the  strength  of  her  U-boat  squadrons  as  an  offset 
to  the  weakness  of  her  surface  fleet.  The  development 
of  the  submarine  was  an  afterthought.  Tirpitz  lavished 
hundreds  of  millions  of  marks  on  battleships  and  battle 
cruisers.  With  these  he  intended  to  make  the  North 
Sea  a  German  lake — justifying  the  nomenclature  of  the 
old  geographers,  who  used  to  call  it  the  German  Ocean. 

He  overlooked  the  fact  that  in  surface  sea  fighting 
under  modern  conditions  inferiority  is  fatal.  A  weaker 
army,  favoured  by  accidents  of  position,  may  easily 
defeat  a  stronger  army.  But  on  the  sea  there  is  no 
advantage  of  position.  The  inferior  squadron  or  fleet 
rarely  wins  and  is  always  lucky  to  escape  destruction. 
Off  Jutland  the  German  navy  was  clearly  beaten, 
though  low  visibility  conditions  and  Admiral  Jellicoe's 
caution  allowed  it  to  slink  back  to  port.  Its  next  ap- 
pearance in  the  open  was  for  the  purpose  of  surrendering. 


Sea  Power  in  the  War  79 

Tirpitz  had  builded  for  defeat,  not  for  victory.  His 
naval  policy  was  radically  wrong.  Sea  power  is  a 
long,  slow  growth.  And  of  all  the  belligerent  nations 
of  the  first  rank  Germany  was  the  least  qualified  in 
a  military  sense  to  engage  in  a  war  at  sea.  Her  future 
lay  elsewhere.  And  she  would  probably  have  made  it 
secure  if  she  had  only  followed  from  the  beginning  the 
modest  but  adequate  naval  policy  of  Austria-Hungary, 
her  lightly  esteemed  neighbour  and  ally. 


CHAPTER  V 

DEVELOPMENT   OF   GERMAN    STRATEGY 

The  Great  War  of  1 914-18  demolished  all  pre- 
cedents. It  resulted  in  the  most  stupendous  outpour- 
ing of  human  energy  ever  known.  All  the  standards 
by  which  military  and  economic  effort  had  been  meas- 
ured in  the  past  suddenly  became  obsolete. 

It  was  a  commonplace  among  financiers  before  the 
war  began  that  no  European  conflict  could  last  more 
than  twelve  months  without  bankrupting  the  belliger- 
ents. International  finance  was  supposed  to  hold  the 
purse  strings  of  all  governments,  and  was  expected  to 
call  a  halt  in  time  on  ruinous  war  expenditures. 

But  in  their  wildest  dreams  the  financial  experts 
had  never  sensed  what  modern  industrial  nations  can 
do  when  they  plunge  into  war.  The  two  belligerent 
groups  put  50,000,000  men  in  the  field  and  spent  over 
$250,000,000,000  for  war  purposes.  Once  the  pent- 
up  resources  of  the  countries  at  war  were  unleashed  all 
thought  of  anything   short   of  victory  or  exhaustion 

was  abandoned.     The  United  States  was  in  the  war 

80 


Development  of  German  Strategy    81 

only  a  little  more  than  eighteen  months.  Yet  in  that 
period  it  spent  or  contracted  to  spend  $55,000,000,000, 
including  $10,000,000,000  loaned  to  its  Allies.  The 
total  American  Civil  War  debt  was  only  about 
$3,000,000,000. 

Economically  and  financially,  the  war  fought  itself. 
It  soon  got  beyond  control  of  those  who  may  have 
believed  in  the  beginning  that  they  would  be  able  to 
direct  it  or  to  set  bounds  to  it.  It  was  too  vast  an 
enterprise  to  be  shaped  by  any  government  or  group 
of  governments.  It  plunged  along  to  its  conclusion 
in  its  own  ponderous  way,  smashing  all  forecasts  and 
calculations. 

This  is  true  to  a  large  extent  of  the  military  conduct 
of  the  war  as  well  as  of  its  economic  conduct.  No 
General  Staff  was  prepared  for  what  actually  happened 
when  the  huge  armies  of  the  twentieth  century — na- 
tions under  arms,  in  reality — clashed  in  the  field  under 
revolutionized  conditions  of  warfare.  No  General  Staff 
fought  the  war  as  it  had  planned  to  fight  it.  After 
the  first  two  months  none  even  saw  very  clearly  what 
was  ahead.  By  reason  of  its  immensity,  the  war 
mastered  the  strategists  and  developed  its  own  strategy. 
Both  tactically  and  strategically  it  had  to  find  itself. 

Germany  was  immensely  better  prepared  for  the 
struggle  than  her  opponents  were.     She  was  able  to 


82     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

seize  the  offensive  at  the  outset,  and,  from  the  point 
of  view  of  grand  strategy,  she  retained  it  until  the 
contest  was  in  its  last  stages.  As  the  aggressor  and  as 
the  most  highly  organized  military  state  in  Europe, 
she  should  have  been  able,  if  any  belligerent  was,  to 
reduce  her  strategy  to  the  simplest  and  clearest  terms. 
Having  freedom  of  action,  interior  lines,  and  a  choice 
of  operating  fronts,  she  might  reasonably  have  been 
expected  to  formulate  and  pursue  a  sharply  defined 
and  consistent  military  policy. 

Yet,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  the  most  striking  feature  of 
German  strategy  throughout  the  war  was  its  lack  of 
clarity  and  unification.  German  conceptions  were 
confused  by  the  nuge  initial  failure  at  the  Marne. 
The  effects  of  that  confusion  were  never  eradicated. 

It  was  fairly  clear  after  the  Marne  and  Flanders 
campaigns  of  19 14  that  German  victory  was  not  to 
be  achieved  in  the  West.  The  forces  there  were  too 
evenly  balanced.  The  speedy  introduction  of  trench 
warfare  also  tended  to  enforce  a  condition  of  barren 
deadlock  on  the  Western  Front.  Germany's  true  field 
of  military  exploitation  therefore  lay  in  the  East. 
Circumstances  drove  her  there  in  the  spring  of  191 5. 
Her  easiest  and  most  fruitful  victories  were  won  there. 
The  opening  up  of  Russia,  Rumania,  Serbia,  the  Cau- 
casus, and  Persia  offered  her  a  splendid  opportunity 


Development  of  German  Strategy    83 

to  offset  the  economic  injury  done  her  by  the  Allied 
Blockade. 

But  she  would  not  pursue  her  Eastern  campaigns 
to  their  logical  conclusion,  contenting  herself  at  the 
same  time  with  a  strict  defensive  in  the  West.  Her 
General  Staff  seemed  unable  to  throw  off  the  spell  of 
the  elder  Moltke's  achievements  in  1870-71.  What 
he  had  done  the  younger  Moltke,  Falkenhayn,  and 
Ludendorff  all  hankered  to  do.  The  first  failed  at  the 
Marne  in  19 14;  the  second  failed  at  Verdun  in  191 6; 
the  third  failed  at  the  Marne  in  191 8. 

Moltke  the  Younger  was  less  blameworthy  than  the 
others.  He  had  no  opportunity  to  amend  his  theories 
in  the  light  of  experience.  The  other  two  had  ample 
opportunity  to  do  so.  But,  one  and  all,  they  sought 
to  make  the  conduct  of  the  war  conform  to  fixed,  pre- 
conceived strategic  notions  instead  of  letting  their 
strategy  be  determined  by  forces  and  circumstances 
disclosing  themselves  as  the  struggle  progressed.  Ger- 
many never  developed  a  military  leader  who  was  in  the 
true  sense  an  opportunist.  And  in  an  inexact  and 
problematical  art  like  war  opportunism  is  the  outlet 
of  genius. 

The  great  fault  of  the  German  military7  mind  is  its 
rigidity.  It  cannot  readjust  itself  readily  to  unfore- 
seen  conditions.     It   cannot   reverse   itself   with   sup- 


84     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

pleness  when  a  fundamental  misconception  has  to  be 
rectified.  Thus  in  this  war  the  German  military  lead- 
ers were  never  able  to  rid  themselves  of  their  fatal 
delusions  about  the  value  of  German  sea  power  and 
the  necessity  of  a  victorious  offensive  in  the  West. 

What  they  demanded  was  an  orientation  with  which 
they  were  familiar — a  policy  bequeathed  to  them  by 
some  supposed  military  superman  like  the  elder  Moltke 
or  Schlieffen  or  Tirpitz,  and  stamped  with  the  seal  of 
his  oracular  authority.  The  supreme  test  of  a  mili- 
tary operation  in  German  eyes  is  not  whether  it  was 
adapted  to  the  actual  requirements  or  potentialities 
of  a  situation,  but  whether  it  was  or  was  not  executed 
according  to  specifications  prepared  long  in  advance 
— in  other  words,  whether  it  was  or  was  not  what  the 
German  military  writers  call  planmassig.  And  this 
passion  for  adhering  to  routine,  to  the  tradition  of 
General  Staff  infallibility,  and  the  formulas  of  the  past 
— manifested  tactically  in  a  slavish  employment  of 
close  formation  infantry  attacks  all  through  the  earlier 
period  of  the  war — again  and  again  prevented  Germany 
from  reaping  the  full  advantages  of  her  strategical 
freedom  and  of  her  unchallenged  superiority  on  the 
Eastern  Front. 

Germany  began  the  war,  of  course,  with  an  all-em- 
bracing scheme  of  strategy.     The  German  public  had 


Development  of  German  Strategy     85 

long  accepted  the  legend  of  the  elder  Moltke's  sending 
word  to  General  Staff  Headquarters  in  Berlin  when 
France  was  tricked  into  declaring  war  on  Germany 
in  1870:  "Open  drawer  so  and  so."  That  legend  had 
a  basis  of  truth.  Moltke  the  Elder  had  carefully 
planned  the  invasion  of  Alsace-Lorraine,  and  under 
the  simpler  conditions  of  warfare  which  existed  in 
1870  he  was  able  to  conduct  his  campaign  with  an 
appearance  of  marvellous  prevision.  He  defeated  Baz- 
aine  and  MacMahon  according  to  schedule,  captured 
their  armies,  and  reduced  France  to  helplessness. 

Moltke  the  Younger,  when  Germany  declared  war 
on  France  in  191 4,  may  also  have  given  orders  to  open 
a  similar  drawer  in  one  of  the  General  Staff's  cabinets. 
But  he  was  not  to  have  his  way  so  easily  with  France. 
After  going  on  swimmingly  for  five  weeks  his  campaign 
for  Paris  collapsed.  His  armies  were  defeated,  through 
gross  strategical  blunders  at  the  battle  of  the  Marne. 
After  a  short  secondary  campaign  in  Flanders,  which 
also  failed  in  the  large  sense,  the  Germans  were  thrown 
back  on  the  defensive  on  the  Western  Front — a  defen- 
sive which  was  to  last,  except  for  the  Verdun  episode, 
from  December,  1914,  until  March,  1918.  All  German 
strategical  preconceptions  were  thus  shattered  before 
the  war  had  fairly  begun. 

After  the  First  Marne  there  was  a  period  of  extra- 


86     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

ordinary  depression  at  German  Grand  Headquarters. 
Just  after  the  conclusion  of  the  armistice  the  former 
Crown  Prince  of  Prussia  was  reported  as  saying  that 
in  his  opinion  the  Marne  ended  Germany's  hopes  of 
victory.  That  is  only  after-the- event  wisdom — and 
a  poor  quality  of  it  in  the  bargain.  Germany  came 
much  nearer  winning  the  war  on  many  later  occasions 
than  she  did  at  the  culminating  moment  of  her  first 
rush  into  France. 

The  depression  among  the  German  leaders  was 
psychological.  They  saw  a  great  military  gamble 
go  wrong  when,  on  the  basis  of  their  fallacious  deduc- 
tions from  the  elder  Moltke's  victory  over  the  French 
in  1870,  it  should  have  been  successful.  They  were 
amazed  and  disheartened.  They  tried  to  cover  over 
their  defeat  with  childish  misrepresentations.  They 
excised  all  reference  to  the  Marne  from  their  com- 
muniques. They  refused  to  face  open-mindedly  the 
results  of  the  Marne  campaign. 

Yet,  on  its  face,  the  Marne  was  a  warning  that  the 
fundamental  conception  of  German  military  policy 
was  unsound.  The  German  Staff,  still  living  in  glorious 
memories  of  1870-71,  had  grossly  undervalued  the 
power  of  France.  It  had  had  to  pay  a  disconcerting 
penalty  for  that  error.  Lieutenant  General  Baron 
Freytag-Loringhoven  admitted  the  truth  in  191 7  when 


Development  of  German  Strategy    87 

he  wrote:  "The  German  offensive  at  the  beginning  of 
September,  1914,  was  not  powerful  enough  to  over- 
throw the  enemy."  But  if  the  Germans  could  not 
hope  to  overthrow  the  enemy  in  September,  191 4,  when 
Germany's  completer  preparedness  told  more  heavily 
in  her  favour  than  it  could  ever  tell  again,  what  reason- 
able hope  of  victory  lay  in  a  continuation  of  the  Western 
offensive  ? 

The  fundamental  idea  of  German  military  policy — 
the  crushing  of  France — having  proved  illusory,  a 
soldier  of  the  quality  of  Frederick  the  Great,  or  Napo- 
leon or  the  elder  Moltke  would  have  discarded  it. 
But  Germany  had  no  such  soldier.  The  Kaiser  was  a 
military  incompetent.  Worse  than  that,  he  was  sur- 
rounded by  generals  without  genius.  He  could  remove 
the  younger  Moltke.  But  he  could  replace  him  only 
with  a  Falkenhayn,  a  Hindenburg,  or  a  Ludendorff. 

Dr.  Miihlon  says  that  the  younger  Moltke  had  no 
responsibility  for  the  plan  of  operations  which  went 
to  wreck  at  the  Marne.  Freytag-Loringhoven  says 
the  same  thing.  The  plan  was  a  legacy  from  the  days 
of  Count  Schlieffen,  the  elder  Moltke 's  successor  as 
Chief  of  the  General  Staff. 

Count  Schlieffen  was  the  chief  proponent  in  Germany 
of  the  strategy  of  "double  envelopment."  He  wrote 
a  work  called  Cannce,  in  which  he  illustrated  from  Han- 


88     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

nibal's  victor}'  the  working  out  of  his  own  theories. 
Schlieffen  believed  in  retaining  the  enemy's  centre, 
or  even  yielding  to  him  a  little  there,  while  outflanking 
and  enclosing  him  on  both  wings.  A  victory  of  the 
Cannse  type,  he  held,  was  the  only  sort  which  would 
ensure  the  annihilation  of  an  opponent. 

Foch  illustrated  the  Cannse  theory  tactically  and 
locally  at  the  second  battle  of  the  Marne,  when  he 
encouraged  the  Germans  to  push  south  of  the  river, 
between  Chateau-Thierry  and  Dormans,  and  also  to 
move  up  the  Marne  Valley  toward  Epernay,  while 
he  was  preparing  to  strike  their  right  wing  between 
Chateau-Thierry  and  Soissons  and  their  left  wing 
between  Dormans  and  Rheims.  But,  of  course,  Foch 
had  no  idea  of  enveloping  either  the  German  right  wing 
or  the  German  left  wing.  He  was  trying  to  crush  the 
Marne  salient  by  a  breaking  through  operation  on  the 
west  side. 

Freytag-Loringhoven  claims  that  the  Germans  won 
a  Cannas  victory  over  the  Russians  at  Tannenberg  in 
1 9 14,  and  over  the  Rumanians  at  Hermannstadt  in 
1 91 6.  But  they  never  realized  Count  Schlieffen 's  pet 
idea  in  the  West.  By  coming  south  through  Belgium 
in  August,  1914,  the  younger  Moltke  hoped  to  envelop 
the  French  left  wing  east  of  Paris.  His  simultaneous 
operation  on  the  Nancy  front  was  intended  to  shake 


Development  of  German  Strategy     89 

loose  and  envelop  the  French  right  wing,  resting  on 
the  Lorraine  border.  Then  the  French  armies  would 
have  had  to  retreat  in  disorder  south  of  the  Seine  and 
west  of  the  Meuse.  Paris  would  have  fallen  and  all 
the  eastern  frontier  would  have  been  cleared. 

But  through  a  fatal  miscalculation  of  the  strength 
and  fighting  quality  of  the  French  armies  all  these 
plans  went  awry.  Instead  of  enveloping  the  French 
left  to  the  east  of  Paris,  the  German  armies  in  that 
region  were  themselves  threatened  with  envelopment 
by  Maunoury's  flanking  movement  out  of  the  capital. 
Kluck  saved  the  German  western  armies  by  a  quick 
shift  of  front.  But  a  German  retreat  to  the  Aisne  had 
become  inevitable.  Meanwhile  the  attack  on  Nancy 
had  ended  in  a  fiasco. 

Schlieffen's  strategy  broke  down  completely.  This 
was  not  the  younger  Moltke's  fault,  although  he  was 
quickly  made  the  Kaiser's  scapegoat.  He  suffered  for 
the  shortcomings  of  others. 

Yet  if  his  dismissal  had  been  coincident  with  a  radi- 
cal change  in  German  military  policy,  it  would  have 
been  entirely  justified.  It  would  have  indicated  that 
there  were  minds  at  German  headquarters  capable  of 
reading  the  signs  in  the  military  firmament. 

The  Marne  campaign,  and  the  Flanders  campaign 
which   supplemented  it,   both  proved   that   Germany 


90     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

had  little  hope  of  conquering  France.  Germany  was 
not  strong  enough  in  1914,  1915,  191 6,  or  191 7  to  win 
the  war  on  the  Western  Front.  Possibly  she  might 
have  forced  a  draw  there  in  191 8,  after  Russia's  dis- 
appearance, if  she  had  not  wantonly  dragged  the 
United  States  in  as  a  belligerent.  To  a  really  com- 
petent grand  strategist  it  should  have  been  clear  even 
at  the  end  of  1914  that  there  could  be  no  Cannas  in 
the  West.  The  part  of  wisdom,  therefore,  for  the 
Germans  was  to  hold  fast  to  Belgium  and  conquered 
Northern  France  and  pin  the  French  and  British  down 
there  to  a  barren  war  of  positions,  while  bending  every 
energy  to  eliminating  Russia  and  establishing  a  Teuton 
overlordship  of  Middle  and  Eastern  Europe. 

Germany  did  go  east  in  the  spring  of  191 5.  But 
she  went  more  from  compulsion  than  from  choice. 
The  German  plan  of  operations  on  the  Eastern  Front 
had  also  gone  to  wreck.  Moltke  the  Elder  has  told 
us  that  in  1870,  when  there  was  some  reason  at  the 
outset  of  the  war  to  fear  Austrian  co-operation  with 
France,  he  had  decided  to  keep  only  a  few  second-line 
army  corps  in  Saxony  and  Silesia,  to  hold  off  the  Aus- 
trian armies,  while  seeking  a  decision  in  Alsace-Lorraine. 
So  in  1 914  the  German  High  Command  sent  only  a 
few  hundred  thousand  men  into  East  Prussia  to  con- 
tain the  northern  Russian  armies.     To  Austria-Hungary 


Development  of  German  Strategy    91 

was  confided  the  task  of  an  offensive  into  Poland  which 
should  isolate  Warsaw  and  pin  the  southern  Russian 
armies  to  the  line  of  Brest-Litovsk — the  main  Russian 
line  of  mobilization. 

But  Russia  got  into  the  war  too  quickly.  East 
Prussia  was  invaded.  The  Austro-Hungarian  armies 
were  routed  in  Eastern  Galicia,  lost  Lemberg  and  the 
line  of  the  San,  and  were  driven  at  many  points  beyond 
the  Carpathians.  Hindenburg  crushed  the  Russians 
at  the  battle  of  Tannenberg,  in  August,  1914,  end- 
ing the  East  Prussian  invasion.  But  Austria-Hungary 
could  not  rally  for  many  months  from  her  first  defeats. 
Hindenburg 's  two  campaigns  for  Warsaw,  in  October 
and  December,  1914,  had  failed.  Przemysl  was  lost 
in  March,  191 5.  It  was  imperative  that  Germany 
should  drop  offensive  operations  in  the  West  and  go 
east  to  reckon  with  the  Russians,  who  now  stood 
almost  at  the  gates  of  Cracow. 

Turkey's  entry  into  the  war  had  also  greatly  ex- 
tended Germany's  military  opportunities  in  the  East. 
The  barring  of  the  Dardanelles  and  Turkey's  successful 
defence  of  the  Straits  had  dashed  Allied  expectations 
of  connecting  up  the  Russian  and  Western  fronts. 
With  almost  no  help  from  Germany  Turkey  had  iso- 
lated Russia,  thus  insuring  the  latter's  eventual  col- 
lapse.    But  Turkey  needed  to  be  reinforced  and  to  be 


92     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

supplied  with  munitions.  A  corridor  from  Berlin  to 
Constantinople  had  to  be  cut  through  the  Balkans. 

Every  military  consideration  now  compelled  a  con- 
centration of  Germany's  main  effort  in  the  East.  So 
on  May  Day,  191 5,  Hindenburg  and  Mackensen  began 
their  great  drive  against  the  Russians  in  Galicia  and 
Poland.  In  four  months  they  had  cleared  Galicia, 
Poland,  Courland,  part  of  Lithuania,  and  all  of  Buko- 
wina.  Then  Mackensen  turned  south .  Bulgaria  joined 
the  Central  Alliance.  Serbia,  Montenegro,  and  Albania 
were  overrun,  Rumania  was  cut  off,  and  Turkey  was 
linked  up  securely  with  the  new  German  Mittel-Europa. 

No  other  German  campaign  showed  results  compar- 
able in  a  military  and  political  sense  with  those  of  this 
one.  In  a  single  summer  Germany  had  changed  the 
face  of  Europe — and  at  a  cost  so  small  as  to  be  almost 
negligible.  She  was  on  the  true  road  to  the  only  sort 
of  empire  which  was  within  the  scope  of  her  military 
resources — towards  a  true  solidification  of  her  Con- 
tinental position.  By  December,  191 5,  she  was  in  a 
condition  either  to  ask  or  to  grant  a  peace  assuring  her 
supremacy  in  Europe. 

Hindenburg,  who  had  been  the  operating  chief  on 
the  Eastern  Front,  became  the  idol  of  the  German 
people.  They  hastened  to  erect  huge  wooden  images 
of  him  and  drive  them  full  of  gold  and  silver  nails — a 


Development  of  German  Strategy    93 

primitive  Germanic  method  of  deification.  In  this 
they  obeyed  a  sound  instinct.  Hindenburg  stood 
above  all  things  for  an  Eastern  military  policy.  His 
fame  was  the  outgrowth  of  the  natural  trend  of  the 
war. 

But  the  German  military  mind  was  unconvinced. 
Falkenhayn,  Moltke's  successor,  was  a  Westerner  by 
predilection.  He  conceived  the  idea  of  stabilizing 
the  Eastern  Front  and  turning  west  again.  At  Grand 
Headquarters  the  lure  of  Paris  was  still  potent.  All 
through  the  winter  of  191 5-1 6  Falkenhayn  was  busy 
preparing  his  "break  through"  on  the  Verdun  front, 
intended  to  destroy  the  morale  of  the  French  and  at 
the  same  time  to  anticipate  and  forestall  the  offensive 
on  the  Somme  which  the  British  were  nearly  ready  to 
begin. 

The  Verdun  campaign  was  an  unrelieved  failure. 
It  cost  Falkenhayn  several  hundred  thousand  casual- 
ties. It  depleted  his  precious  strategic  reserve.  It 
gave  France  a  new  sense  of  security,  and  it  did  not 
delay  by  a  week  the  anticipated  Allied  offensive  in 
Artois  and  Picardy. 

Falkenhayn  was  disgraced,  Hindenburg  was  pro- 
moted to  be  Chief  of  Staff,  and  Germany  returned  to 
a  patient  defensive  in  the  West.  For  a  second  time 
the   pressure  of   circumstances  called   Germany  east. 


94     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

The  defeat  at  Verdun  had  stirred  the  Russians  to  ac- 
tion. The  Brusiloff  offensive  of  191 6  was  at  hand 
and  Rumania  was  showing  signs  of  joining  the  Entente. 

Brusiloff  won  some  notable  victories  over  the  Austro- 
Hungarians  in  Volhynia,  Galicia,  and  Bukowina.  Tens 
of  thousands  of  disaffected  Czecho-Slovak  and  South 
Slav  troops  threw  down  their  arms  and  surrendered 
to  the  Russians.  Considerable  territory  was  recovered. 
But  when  German  reinforcements  arrived  the  Russian 
armies  were  halted.  It  was  Russia's  last  flash  of 
offensive  strength.  Pacifist  intrigues  inside  the  govern- 
ment at  Petrograd  now  began  to  aggravate  the  diffi- 
culties of  the  armies  in  the  field. 

Rumania  came  into  the  war  in  the  fall  of  191 6 — 
relying  on  Allied  promises,  which  were  never  to  be 
fulfilled.  The  Germans  were  prepared  to  crush  this 
small,  exposed  Balkan  state.  A  concentric  attack 
from  Transylvania,  Serbia,  and  Bulgaria  soon  cleared 
all  of  Wallachia.  Bucharest  fell — hardly  six  weeks 
after  war  was  declared. 

Here  again  the  military,  political,  and  economic 
possibilities  of  an  exploitation  of  the  East  Front  were 
startlingly  demonstrated.  Germany  could  fight  and 
win  on  that  front  almost  with  one  hand  tied  behind 
her  back.  Rumania  became  a  new  source  of  food, 
oil,  and  other  war  supplies.     And  the  vast,  inert,  ex- 


Development  of  German  Strategy    95 

hausted  Muscovite  empire  was  now  on  the  point  of 
breaking  up. 

German  grand  strategy  shone  brightest  during  the 
first  six  or  eight  months  of  Hindenburg's  tenure  as 
Chief  of  Staff.  He  remained  always  by  conviction  an 
Easterner.  He  was  satisfied  to  reap  the  advantages 
of  the  Russian  and  Balkan  situations.  He  further 
emphasized  Germany's  proper  defensive  role  in  the 
West  by  planning  and  executing  the  highly  success- 
ful strategical  retirement  of  March,  191 7,  out  of  the 
Noyon  salient.  He  constructed  the  massive  Hinden- 
burg  line  from  La  Fere  to  St.  Quentin,  past  Cambrai, 
and  then  past  Douai  toward  Lens.  It  was  the  line 
which  he  intended  to  hold — and  which  he  did  hold 
successfully  all  through  191 7. 

But  Ludendorff  had  now  begun  to  overshadow 
Hindenburg.  The  former  was  of  the  true  rigid,  ruth- 
less, narrow-visioned  German  General  Staff  type.  He 
was  bitten  with  the  idea  of  German  invincibility.  He 
sympathized  with  the  world  empire  paranoia  of  Tirpitz 
and  the  extreme  pan-Germans.  He  already  pictured 
himself  as  leading  the  eventual  German  march  on 
Paris. 

So  he  let  the  East  slip  more  and  more  out  of  his 
mind's  eye.  He  coquetted  with  the  rabid  naval  and 
Fatherland  Party  group,  which  was  clamouring  for  a 


96     The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

renewal  of  unrestricted  submarine  warfare.  It  was 
Ludendorff's  influence  which  turned  the  scale  in  Janu- 
ary, 191 7,  when  Bethmann-Hollweg's  programme  of 
preventing  war  with  the  United  States  by  concessions 
such  as  were  embodied  in  the  celebrated  Suffolk  note 
was  discarded.  He  drove  Bethmann-Hollweg  out  of 
office.  He  assented  to  the  new  blockade  proclaimed 
by  the  Admiralty,  which  was  in  effect  a  notice  to  all 
neutral  shipping  to  keep  out  of  northern  Atlantic  and 
Mediterranean  waters  or  be  sunk  on  sight.  He  must 
therefore  share  with  Tirpitz  the  responsibility  for  the 
fatal  decision  which  turned  Germany  back  from  the 
path  of  victory.  Imitating  Falkenhayn,  he  again 
perverted  German  military  policy  and  nullified  the 
effects  of  all  the  imposing  German  successes  on  the 
Eastern  Front. 

The  Russian  revolution  arrived.  With  dramatic 
swiftness  the  empire  perished;  the  Duma  government 
rose  and  fell;  Kerensky  succeeded  and  sanctioned  the 
brief  and  ineffective  Korniloff  offensive  in  Bukowina 
and  Galicia  and  then  fell  himself.  Russia  now  dis- 
appeared as  a  military  factor.  Had  Germany  held  off 
on  her  unrestricted  submarine  campaign  she  would 
practically  have  won  the  war  by  the  end  of  191 7. 
Russia  lay  open  for  partition.  As  the  farce-tragedy 
of  Brest-Litovsk  was  to  prove,  no  obstacle  existed  any 


Development  of  German  Strategy    97 

longer  to  German  penetration  as  far  as  the  Urals,  into 
the  Caucasus  and  into  Persia. 

But  the  Germans  were  never  able  to  consolidate  their 
empire  in  the  East.  LudendorfT  had  loaded  himself 
down  with  other  burdens.  Having  dragged  America 
into  the  war,  it  was  now  incumbent  on  him  to  go  west 
and  conquer  Italy,  France,  and  Great  Britain  before 
American  man  power  should  begin  to  flow  across  the 
Atlantic. 

He  struck  at  Italy  first,  winning,  in  November, 
1 91 7,  the  great  victory  of  Caporetto — one  of  the  com- 
pletest  of  the  war.  Italy  was  thrown  roughly  back 
on  the  defensive,  losing  nearly  all  Venetia,  about 
two  hundred  thousand  prisoners,  and  probably  more 
than  one  thousand  guns.  Only  the  approach  of  bad 
weather  saved  Venice.  Italy  didn't  recover  from  this 
blow  for  many  months. 

Next  came  the  great  drive  of  191 8  in  Northern  France. 
On  this  Ludendorff  staked  everything  that  Germany 
had  left.  There  is  reason  to  think  that  Hindenburg 
dissented  from  his  colleague's  win-all-lose-all  policy, 
and  that  William  II  was  inclined  to  agree  with  Hinden- 
burg. 

It  will  always  remain  a  question  whether  German y 
did  not  still  have  a  chance  in  the  spring  of  191 8  to  fight 
the  war  to  a  draw  by  standing  on  the  defensive  in 


98      The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

France,  while  attempting  to  develop  Finland,  the 
Ukraine,  Poland,  Lithuania,  the  Baltic  Provinces,  and 
possibly  even  Rumania,  Bessarabia,  and  the  Crimea 
into  military  assets. 

Certainly,  if  she  had  continued  on  the  defensive 
Germany  could  not  have  lost  the  war  in  191 8 — per- 
haps not  in  1 919.  The  Allies  were  bound  to  remain 
gravely  handicapped  so  long  as  they  continued  to 
renounce  the  advantages  of  unity  of  command.  And 
Allied  unity  of  command  would  hardly  have  come  if 
Ludendorff  had  not  broken  the  British  line  west  of 
St.  Quentin  in  March,  1918,  and  nearly  destroyed  the 
British  Fifth  Army. 

Ludendorff's  offensive  in  France  forced  the  selection 
of  Foch  as  the  Allied  generalissimo  and  vastly  accel- 
erated the  transportation  of  American  troops  to  Europe. 
Without  Foch  and  without  the  American  reinforcement 
the  Allies  would  probably  have  made  little  more  pro- 
gress on  the  Western  Front  in  191 8  than  they  had  made 
in  1917. 

But  Ludendorff  was  a  dogmatist  and  a  plunger.  He 
insisted  on  having  his  way  and  had  it.  By  his  errors 
of  tactics  as  well  as  of  strategy  he  quickly  wrecked 
the  great  German  military  establishment. 

Yet  long  before  the  Second  Marne  German  political 
and  military  obtuseness  had  fumbled  away  all  chance  of 


Development  of  German  Strategy    99 

victory.  The  Germans  never  learned  the  lesson  of 
the  First  Marne.  They  could  have  won  their  war  in 
Eastern  Europe.  Instead,  they  wanted  to  win  it  on 
the  sea  and  in  Western  Europe.  What  the  First  Marne, 
Verdun,  and  the  first  submarine  campaign  had  already 
proved,  the  Second  Marne  and  the  second  submarine 
campaign  only  proved  over  again.  It  was  never  within 
the  scope  of  Teuton  resources  to  conquer  the  world. 
And  the  resources  which  would  have  sufficed  to  conquer 
Eastern  Europe  were  wasted  in  trying  to  reduce  Paris 
and  subjugate  France. 


CHAPTER  VI 

DEVELOPMENT  OF  ALLIED  STRATEGY 

Germany  never  achieved  clarity  in  her  strategy, 
although  her  true  military  policy  was  obvious.  She 
had  seized  the  offensive,  and  held  on  to  it.  Her  geo- 
graphical position  offered  her  enormous  advantages. 
She  fought  on  interior  lines.  She  enjoyed  unity  of 
command.  Everything  contributed  to  give  her  a 
free  hand  in  a  military  way.  Yet  she  could  never  fix 
her  goal  clearly  in  her  mind's  eye  and  move  steadily 
toward  it. 

The  case  with  the  Allies  was  entirely  different. 
Their  geographical  position  was  against  them.  They 
were  strung  out  around  the  periphery  of  a  vast  circle. 
At  the  beginning  of  the  war  the  British  Isles,  France, 
and  Belgium  constituted  one  Allied  cluster  in  north- 
western Europe.  Serbia  and  Montenegro — forming 
a  second  group — were  isolated  in  the  Balkans.  Russia 
was  cut  off  on  the  distant  Eastern  Front. 

The  northern  sea  passage  to  Russia  through  the 
Baltic  was  sealed  by  German  mines  in  the  Cattegat 


Development  of  Allied  Strategy    101 

and  the  Danish  Great  Belt.  The  southern  passage 
through  the  Dardanelles  was  blocked  by  Turkey. 
Only  the  precarious  Arctic  Ocean  route  remained  open 
— and  the  almost  prohibitive  'round-the-globe  con- 
nection through  Vladivostok. 

When  Italy  came  into  the  war,  in  191 5,  the  Atlantic 
and  Mediterranean  fronts  were  partially  linked  up. 
But  Italy  had  been  a  belligerent  hardly  six  months 
when  Serbia  and  Montenegro  were  overrun  by  the 
Germans.  For  more  than  two  years  thereafter  the 
only  secure  footing  left  to  the  Allies  in  the  Balkan 
peninsula  was  the  intrenched  camp  of  Salonica.  In 
Asia  there  were  minor  Allied  operating  fronts  in  lower 
Palestine,  in  Mesopotamia,  and  in  Armenia — all  distinct 
and  widely  separated  from  one  another.  German 
communications  radiated  from  the  centre  of  the  circle 
within  which  the  Teuton  Powers  were  beleaguered. 
Allied  communications  around  the  circumference  were 
straggling  and  difficult  to  maintain. 

The  primary  aim  of  Allied  strategy  was  to  connect 
the  scattered  exterior  fronts  and  to  co-ordinate  the 
operations  on  them.  If  the  Russian  front  from  the 
Baltic  Sea  to  the  Black  Sea  could  be  joined  physically 
with  the  Balkan,  Italian,  and  Franco-Belgian  fronts 
the  more  distant  Asian  fronts  would  become  negligible. 
Turkey  could  not  long  defend  herself  in  Mesopotamia, 


io2    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Palestine,  and  Armenia  if  the  passage  of  the  Dardanelles 
were  forced.  Constantinople  captured  and  the  Balkan 
battle  line  advanced  to  the  Danube,  the  circle  within 
which  the  Central  Powers  were  confined  would  become 
too  narrow  for  comfort.  Concerted  and  continuous 
Allied  pressure  would  then  be  possible  at  all  points  of 
the  circumference — the  sort  of  pressure  which  Foch 
applied  superbly  after  August,  191 8. 

But  the  Allies  never  forced  the  Dardanelles  Straits. 
The  Western  Powers  did  not  succeed  in  getting  into 
actual  contact  with  the  Russians,  either  in  Europe  or 
in  Asia.  The  nearest  approach  to  this  great  strategical 
objective  was  the  temporary  junction  of  a  small  body 
of  Cossacks  with  the  British  advance  guard  in  the  Tigris 
Valley,  north-east  of  Bagdad,  in  the  spring  of  191 7. 
So  nearly  till  the  end  of  the  war  the  Allies  had  to  fight 
disjointedly  on  seven  different  fronts. 

The  results  of  their  scattered  and  wasteful  effort 
were  appalling.  Russia  was  put  out  of  the  war  because 
she  was  not  highly  organized  enough  industrially  to 
supply  herself  with  guns  and  munitions.  She  needed 
supplies  and  a  stiffening  of  first-class  western  officers 
and  troops — the  sort  of  stiffening  which  Germany 
constantly  furnished  to  the  Austro-Hungarians,  Bul- 
garians, and  Turks.  She  couldn't  get  them,  and  in 
spite  of  her  immense  surplus  of  man  power  she  steadily 


Development  of  Allied  Strategy    103 

deteriorated  in  the  field,  as  she  had  done  ten  years 
before  in  the  war  with  Japan.  Military  exhaustion 
in  her  case  was  aggravated  by  pro-German  perfidy 
inside  the  Russian  Court  and  Cabinet.  Russia  passed 
out  of  the  war  for  all  practical  purposes  at  the  end  of 
191 6.  While  she  was  in  it  no  single  purpose  of  Entente 
strategy  was  achieved. 

The  Allies  had  shown  themselves  incapable  of  a 
unified  concentric  offensive.  The  reason  of  this  lay 
on  the  surface.  They  were  unable  to  attain  anything 
like  unity  of  command.  Germany  absolutely  domi- 
nated the  Quadruple  Alliance.  Her  General  Staff's 
word  was  law  for  all  the  Teuton  Powers.  But  there 
was  no  similar  co-ordinating  influence  on  the  other  side. 
Great  Britain  and  France  were  loyal  associates.  But 
neither  wanted  to  yield  military  priority  to  the  other. 

National  pride  and  interest  stood  in  the  way  of  a 
merger.  France,  by  the  superiority  of  her  military 
organization  and  her  greater  wealth  of  military  talent, 
was  logically  entitled  to  leadership.  But  Great  Britain 
had  responded  to  France's  appeal  for  help.  She  was 
preparing  to  raise  armies  equal  in  size  to  those  of  France. 
She  was  conducting  campaigns  of  her  own  in  Palestine 
and  Mesopotamia.  She  furnished  the  great  bulk  of 
the  forces  for  the  Gallipoli  expedition.  She  was  loath 
to  surrender  control  of  her  own  armies — even  of  those 


io4    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

actually  on  French  soil.  And  France  was  never  in  a 
position  to  ask  her  to  do  so.  Only  the  urgency  of  the 
United  States  and  the  uneasiness  in  Great  Britain 
following  the  defeat  of  the  British  Fifth  Army  before 
St.  Quentin,  in  March,  191 8,  cleared  the  way  for  the 
tardy  nomination  of  Foch  as  the  Allied  generalissimo. 
Up  to  that  time  English  military  opinion  had  stood 
out  for  a  divided  command,  although  the  Premier, 
Mr.  Lloyd-George,  favoured  unification. 

Italy  entered  the  war  in  pursuance  of  her  own  na- 
tional ends.  She  wanted  to  secure  these — to  recover 
Trieste  and  the  Trentino  and  to  establish  herself  on 
the  eastern  coast  of  the  Adriatic.  She  had  her  own 
strategical  plans,  and  the  other  Entente  Powers  could 
not  expect  to  interfere  with  them.  She  found  the 
Austro-Hungarian  defence  of  the  Isonzo  unexpectedly 
obstinate.  She  asked  for  help  in  pushing  her  campaign 
for  Trieste  and  Laibach.  But  France  and  Great  Brit- 
ain preferred  to  use  their  troops  elsewhere.  After 
Caporetto  the  Italians  called  for  aid  in  defending 
Venice.  The  French  and  British  then  sent  some  divi- 
sions south.  By  that .  time  Allied  unity  of  command 
was  approaching  realization. 

As  for  Russia,  there  was  never  a  chance  of  anything 
like  real  military  fellowship  with  the  Allies.  The 
Russian    front    remained    remote    and    independent. 


Development  of  Allied  Strategy    105 

Some  general  exchange  of  views  through  the  Allied 
Military  Council  was  possible.  But  this  council  had 
merely  advisory  functions.  The  individual  govern- 
ments and  army  commands  were  not  bound  to  follow 
its  suggestions.  The  first  Russian  offensive  into  East 
Prussia  was  timed  so  as  to  relieve  German  pressure  on 
France  just  before  the  first  battle  of  the  Marne. 
Brusiloff's  great  Volhynian  and  Galician  offensive  of 
191 6  forced  the  Austro-Hungarians  to  suspend  their 
first  attack  on  Italy,  down  the  valley  of  the  Adige. 
But  co-ordination  of  this  sort  was  rare.  The  Allied 
concentric  front,  was  too  vast,  and  the  Allied  strategic 
clearing  house  at  Versailles  was  too  limited  in  scope  and 
authority  to  enforce  any  genuine  unity  of  military  policy. 

But  even  if  the  Entente  Powers  had  more  completely 
pooled  their  strength  and  unified  their  leadership, 
they  would  still  have  had  difficulty  in  working  out  a 
formidable  concerted  offensive.  They  lacked  the 
ability  to  impose  their  strategy  on  Germany.  The 
initial  German  successes  in  Belgium  and  France  had 
pinned  the  French  down  to  the  defensive. 

The  French  departments  which  the  German  armies 
had  overrun  were  the  chief  industrial  section  of  France. 
From  September,  19 14,  to  September,  191 8,  the  Ger- 
mans were  always  within  sixty  miles  of  Paris.  Most 
of  the  time  they  were  even  closer  than  that.     Paris  is 


io6    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

the  heart  of  France.  It  was  the  paramount  aim  of  the 
French  to  defend  their  capital  and  to  dislodge  the 
invaders  from  French  soil.  Every  other  object  was 
secondary. 

In  Flanders  the  Germans  threatened  the  Channel 
ports,  which  were  almost  as  important  to  the  British 
as  Dover  and  Folkestone.  The  French  and  British 
armies  thus  came  to  grips  with  the  Germans  in  North- 
ern France,  and  felt — often  to  an  unreasonable  degree 
— that  they  could  not  afford  to  let  go  in  order  to  carry 
the  war  elsewhere.  They  were  tied  down,  in  a  sense, 
to  the  Western  Front,  not  alone  because  it  was  the 
front  nearest  their  bases,  but  because  it  was  the  front 
covering  Paris  and  London. 

Many  Allied  critics  have  written  about  the  contro- 
versy between  the  "Westerners"  and  the  "Easterners" 
as  if  it  involved  a  choice  between  two  spheres  of  opera- 
tion which  were  equally  open.  But  complete  freedom 
of  action  was  denied  both  to  the  British  and  the  French 
■ — to  the  French  of  course,  much  more  than  to  the 
British.  A  French  generalissimo  would  have  felt 
morally  compelled — so  long  as  no  direct  connection 
with  Russia  could  be  established — to  confine  his  offen- 
sives to  the  French  front.  That  was  the  inevitable 
result  of  the  German  occupation  of  Belgium  and  North- 
ern France. 


Development  of  Allied  Strategy    107 

The  Allied  local  offensives  in  the  West  were  really 
a  form  of  defensive.  Germany  could  turn  east  or 
west  at  will,  because  the  offensive  was  always  hers 
in  the  broad  sense.  French  and  British  strategy, 
whatever  form  it  took,  was  more  or  less  conditioned  on 
protecting  Paris  and  the  Channel  ports. 

The  unforeseen  developments  of  the  war  put  all  a 
priori  Entente  strategy  out  of  joint.  France  and  Russia 
had  made  plans  as  early  as  1892  to  meet  an  attack 
by  the  Triple  Alliance.  At  that  time  Russia  was 
rated  much  higher  as  a  military  power  than  the  facts 
justified.  She  had  defeated  Turkey  completely  in 
1877-78.  She  still  retained  much  of  the  military 
reputation  she  had  built  up  in  the  Napoleonic  Wars. 
The  war  with  Japan  had  not  yet  disclosed  her  de- 
cadence. It  was  natural,  therefore,  that  the  French 
should  have  counted  in  1892  on  being  able  to  make 
headway,  with  Russia  as  an  ally,  against  Germany, 
Austria-Hungary,  and  Italy. 

According  to  the  secret  military  agreements  of  1892 
(made  public  in  September,  1918,  after  the  Germans 
had  obtained  copies  of  them  from  the  archives  at 
Petrograd),  France  and  Russia  expected  to  be  able  to 
crush  Germany,  while  containing  the  Austro-Hungarian 
and  Italian  armies. 

These    calculations    were    entirely    fallacious.     The 


108    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

French  and  Russian  staffs  estimated  that  Germany 
would  be  able  to  put  into  the  field  at  the  outset  1 ,550,000 
men  and  3564  field  guns.  Austria-Hungary  was  ex- 
pected to  mobilize  on  the  Russian  front  900,000  men, 
with  1776  guns.  Italy  was  counted  on  to  muster  on 
the  Italian  side  of  the  Alps  360,000  men  and  1092  guns. 
Says  the  report  of  General  de  Miribel,  of  the  French 
General  Staff,  which  was  transmitted  to  Petrograd 
along  with  the  military  protocols: 

The  forces  of  the  Triple  Alliance  in  the  first  line 
therefore  would  be  137  infantry  divisions,  with  three 
divisions  of  cavalry,  nineteen  divisions  of  inde- 
pendent cavalry,  and  6432  field  guns,  or  a  total  of 
2,810,000  men. 

France  intended  to  employ  in  the  first  line,  after 
providing  for  the  defence  of  Algiers  and  Tunis  and 
of  her  coasts,  seventy-five  divisions  of  infantry,  seven 
divisions  of  independent  cavalry,  and  3370  field  guns, 
a  total  of  1,500,000  men.  Russia,  after  safeguarding 
her  Turkish  frontiers,  was  to  supply  sixty-six  infantry 
divisions,  twenty  divisions  of  cavalry,  80,000  Cossacks, 
and  3290  guns.  The  Franco-Russian  forces  were  to 
total  3,150,000  men  and  7160  guns- — showing  a  slight 
Entente  superiority  both  in  troops  and  artillery. 

The  Franco-Russian  compact  called  for  a  vigorous 
offensive    against    Germany.     The    French   agreed   to 


Development  of  Allied  Strategy    109 

devote  more  than  five  sixths  of  their  first  line  troops 
to  such  an  effort.  They  planned  to  use  not  more  than 
ten  of  their  seventy-five  infantry  divisions  on  the 
Italian  front,  which  was  strongly  protected  by  moun- 
tain barriers.  The  other  sixty-five  were  to  be  used  on 
the  German  border. 

French  strategy  was  summarized  in  these  sentences: 

The  French  General  Staff  is  penetrated  by  the 
principle  that  in  such  a  struggle  the  essential  object 
is  to  prosecute  the  destruction  of  the  principal  enemy. 
The  defeating  of  the  others  must  inevitably  follow. 
In  a  word,  once  Germany  were  conquered,  the  Franco- 
Russian  armies  would  be  able  to  impose  their  will 
on  Austria  and  Italy. 

Russia  was  therefore  to  model  her  policy  after 
France's.  She  was  to  contain  the  Austro-Hungarians 
in  Galicia,  Bukowina,  and  Southern  Poland  with  thirty- 
three  divisions  and  employ  her  other  thirty-three  divi- 
sions in  an  invasion  of  East  Prussia. 

These  forces  [said  the  agreement],  added  to  the 
sixty-five  divisions  of  the  French  army,  would  be 
sufficiently  powerful,  especially  if  they  arrived  in 
time,  to  make  an  end  of  the  German  army. 

Futile  expectations!  Italy  broke  away  from  the 
Triple  Alliance  in  191 4,  as  soon  as  war  was  declared. 
Her  neutrality  enabled  France  to  disgarnish  the  Italian 


no    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

frontier  and  concentrate  all  her  first  line  divisions  in 
the  North.  Russia  did  "arrive  in  time"  on  the  East 
Prussian  border.  But  the  East  Prussian  invasion 
was  short-lived.  It  ended  in  the  huge  disaster  of 
Tannenberg.  The  Russians  won  an  initial  victory 
over  the  Germans  at  Gumbinnen — in  the  early  days 
of  August,  1914.  But  thereafter  they  never  succeeded 
in  defeating  the  Germans  except  when  fighting  on  the 
defensive.  Russia  as  a  military  power  was  no  longer 
in  the  same  class  with  Germany  or  France.  Her  armies 
could  still  defeat  those  of  Austria-Hungary  or  Turkey. 
But  they  were  always  hopelessly  incapable,  through 
defects  in  equipment,  leadership,  and  morale,  of  an 
offensive  against  Germany. 

The  natural  result  was  that  the  Russians  abandoned 
the  strategic  precept  which  the  French  staff  had  enun- 
ciated— that  "the  essential  object  is  to  prosecute  the 
destruction  of  the  principal  enemy."  They  turned 
the  force  of  their  attack  against  Austria-Hungary,  the 
secondary  enemy.  On  the  Austro-Hungarian  front 
they  had  a  series  of  remarkable  successes.  They  con- 
quered Bukowina  and  more  than  two  thirds  of  Galicia. 
They  captured  the  fortress  of  Przemysl  with  its  garrison 
of  130,000  men.  They  fought  their  way  across  the 
Carpathians.  In  the  first  nine  months  of  the  war 
they  buoyed  up  the  hopes  of  the  Entente,  and  they 


Development  of  Allied  Strategy    in 

might  have  continued  to  be  a  factor  of  the  greatest 
importance  if  France  and  Great  Britain  had  been  able 
to  munition  them,  steady  them,  or  direct  their  military 
energies,  as  Germany  did  with  her  weaker  associates. 
But  Russian  isolation  was  always  a  fatal  obstacle  to 
the  accomplishment  of  the  preconcerted  ends  of  Entente 
strategy. 

France,  too,  was  tragically  unable  to  live  up  to  her 
strategical  conceptions.  She  had  greatly  underesti- 
mated German  preparedness.  Instead  of  invading 
Germany,  she  was  forced  to  a  four  years'  defence  of 
her  own  territory.  At  the  First  Marne  it  was  not  a 
question  of  her  "making  an  end  of  the  German  army," 
but  of  herself  escaping  being  made  an  end  of. 

Joffre  did  launch  a  French  offensive  in  August,  19 14, 
as  a  stopper  to  the  German  invasion  of  Belgium.  It 
showed  his  fine  spirit  of  confidence  in  the  armies  under 
his  command.  But  it  had  little  else  to  recommend  it. 
The  dash  into  Alsace,  the  advance  across  the  Seille 
toward  Metz,  and  the  movement  east  of  the  Meuse 
into  the  Ardennes  were  strategical  errors.  They  were 
based  on  a  miscalculation  of  German  strength.  Joffre 's 
idea,  apparently,  was  that  the  irruption  of  the  German 
right  wing  through  Belgium  could  be  halted  by  French 
pressure  on  the  armies  constituting  the  German  left 
wing. 


ii2    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

It  could  have  been  if  the  French  armies  had  been 
considerably  superior  to  the  German  in  numbers.  But 
even  adding  the  British  contingent  the  French  had 
no  superiority.  General  Bernhardi  had  pointed  out 
in  his  book  How  Germany  Makes  War,  a  companion 
piece  to  Germany  and  the  Next  War,  that  if  the  Germans 
elected  to  invade  France  through  Belgium,  they  could 
well  afford  to  allow  the  French  armies  on  the  Lorraine 
and  Alsace  front  to  make  some  progress  toward  the 
Rhine.  This  progress  would  throw  them  farther  to 
the  east  and  facilitate  the  success  of  an  envelopment 
of  the  French  left  close  to  Paris,  such  as  Kluck 
attempted. 

Joffre  made  the  experiment,  however.  It  failed 
completely.  And  from  that  time  on  until  the  armistice 
was  signed  the  Allied  armies  on  the  West  Front  were 
never  again  in  a  position  to  invade  Germany. 

After  November,  1914,  the  revolution  in  tactics 
brought  about  by  trench  warfare  overweighted  the 
offensive  and  wholly  negatived  the  idea  of  obtain- 
ing a  decision  against  the  most  powerful  opponent. 
There  was  a  reversion  to  immobile  warfare — to  the 
stagnation  of  trench  operations,  which  were,  in  effect, 
siege  operations  conducted  in  the  open  field.  With 
deep,  continuous  defence  lines,  stretching  from  Switzer- 
land to  the  North  Sea,  envelopment  ceased  to  be  a 


Development  of  Allied  Strategy    113 

possibility.  The  only  grand  scale  offensive  which 
was  practicable  was  an  attempt  at  "breaking  through" 
after  the  Napoleonic  manner. 

Joffre's  famous  policy  of  "nibbling"  aimed  at  breach- 
ing the  German  defence  barrier  at  one  point  or  another 
— trusting  to  some  favouring  combination  of  cir- 
cumstances to  widen  out  the  opening.  But  no  real 
' '  break-through ' '  was  effected.  The  French  and  British 
offensives  of  191 5,  191 6,  and  191 7  were  all  of  the  same 
pattern.  They  achieved  local  successes — usually  at  an 
excessive  cost.  But  they  never  altered  the  situation 
on  the  Western  Front.  They  could  not  end  the  stale- 
mate of  rigid  positional  warfare.  It  was  not  until 
after  the  battle  of  Cambrai,  in  November,  19 17,  that 
the  way  was  opened  for  a  revival  of  the  warfare  of 
movement.  Up  to  that  time  the  "destruction"  of  the 
German  army  by  the  French  and  British  or  the  "de- 
struction" of  the  British  and  French  armies  by  the 
Germans  was  practically  out  of  the  question. 

The  Allies  made  only  one  real  venture  in  grand  strat- 
egy up  to  the  midsummer  of  19 18.  That  was  the 
attempt  to  force  the  Dardanelles.  Because  this  ven- 
ture failed — and  failed  unnecessarily — Winston  Church- 
ill, its  chief  sponsor,  was  most  unmercifully  criticized. 
But  it  was  a  thoroughly  sound  project.  The  capture 
of  Constantinople,  early  in  191 5,  would  have  localized 


ii4    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

the  war  in  Europe.  It  would  have  saved  Russia, 
connected  and  greatly  shortened  the  Allied  battlefront, 
and  carried  the  war  at  an  early  date  into  Hungary  and 
Austria.  It  would  have  eliminated  Turkey  and  Bul- 
garia as  Teuton  allies. 

The  Dardanelles  expedition  was  a  ghastly  disappoint- 
ment. Great  Britain  was  probably  unequal  in  191 5 
to  the  conduct  of  any  very  highly  organized  offensive. 
And  France  had  to  think  first  of  her  own  protection. 
But  the  Dardanelles  forts  were  weak  and  poorly  muni- 
tioned. They  would  have  fallen  and  the  whole  face 
of  the  war  would  have  been  changed  if  the  British  had 
not  bungled  the  great  opportunity  then  put  in  their 
hands. 

The  fiasco  at  Gallipoli  and  the  fruitlessness  for  a 
long  time  of  the  Salonica  venture  led  to  the  ascendancy 
in  Allied  military  councils  of  the  so-called  Western 
school.  This  school  maintained  that  the  only  hope  of 
Allied  victory  lay  in  the  West  and  that  all  effort  should 
be  concentrated  there.  It  was  necessary  for  France  to 
employ  practically  all  her  strength  on  the  Western 
Front,  and  it  was  more  convenient  for  Great  Britain 
to  help  France  in  the  West  than  to  carry  the  war  else- 
where. Yet  it  is  clear  now  that  France  and  Great 
Britain  alone  could  not  have  won  in  the  West.  The 
sole  chance  of  German  defeat  there  lay  in  the  accumula- 


Development  of  Allied  Strategy    115 

tion  of  forces  sufficiently  superior  to  break  through  the 
German  lines.  And  that  accumulation  was  possible 
only  after  the  United  States  had  entered  the  war. 

The  extreme  Western  school  cherished  an  illusion. 
And  British  military  policy  gradually  admitted  that 
illusion  and  began  to  imitate  the  natural  German  policy 
of  seeking  to  make  conquests  at  the  expense  of  the 
weaker  enemy  powers.  Great  Britain's  imperial  interests 
were  widespread.  She  was  forced  to  consider  Asia  and 
Africa  as  well  as  Europe.  She  intended  to  absorb  the 
lion's  share  of  the  German  colonies.  She  also  realized 
the  advantage  of  establishing  a  claim  on  the  outlying 
portions  of  the  moribund  Turkish  Empire. 

So,  after  defending  Egypt  in  191 4,  Great  Britain 
started  in  slashing  away  at  the  outer  fringes  of  Turkey's 
possessions  in  Asia.  One  expedition  was  started  up  the 
Tigris  River  toward  Bagdad.  Another  was  organized 
to  push  across  the  desert  of  Sinai  into  Southern  Pales- 
tine. Progress  with  both  these  ventures  was  slow. 
The  first  came  to  a  dead  halt  with  the  British  defeat 
below  Ctesiphon  and  the  retreat  to  Kut-el-Amara. 
What  was  left  of  the  first  Mesopotamian  expeditionary 
army  surrendered  to  the  Turks  at  Kut  in  April,  1916. 
Bagdad  was  captured,  however,  by  General  Maude 
about  a  year  later,  and  with  its  fall  Mesopotamia 
passed  into  British  hands.     Jerusalem  was  not  reached 


u6    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

until  December  9,  191 7.  But  meanwhile  Arabia  had 
been  detached  from  Turkey  by  British  diplomacy, 
native  Arabian  states  being  established  under  Entente 
protection. 

These  Eastern  "side  shows"  were  bitterly  denounced 
by  the  extreme  school  of  "Westerners"  in  England. 
But  they  proved  their  value  later,  when  Allenby  de- 
stroyed the  Turkish  armies  north  and  north-east  of 
Jerusalem  in  September,  1918,  and  took  both  Damascus 
and  Aleppo.  That  was  a  finishing  blow  to  Turkey, 
which  at  once  followed  Bulgaria's  example  and  deserted 
the  Quadruple  Alliance.  The  Eastern  campaigns, 
always  important  from  a  political  point  of  view,  had 
helped  to  realize  the  true  Allied  strategical  conception 
of  a  concentric  attack  on  the  Teuton  Powers.  They 
also  enabled  Great  Britain  to  utilize  about  one  million 
East  Indian  troops,  who  could  not  have  been  employed 
to  advantage  in  Europe,  as  experience  with  the  first 
Indian  contingents  in  Flanders  in  the  fall  of  1914  had 
clearly  demonstrated. 

Except  for  the  Russian  offensives  of  1914  in  Galicia 
and  Bukowina,  no  serious  progress  was  made  toward 
an  occupation  of  Austrian  territory.  The  Russians 
nearly  reached  Cracow  in  the  early  days  of  the  war 
and  got  across  the  Dukla  and  Lupkow  passes,  in  the 
Carpathians.     Then   came   the  great  retreat  of  191 5. 


Development  of  Allied  Strategy    117 

Brusiloff  recovered  a  little  ground  in  Galicia  and  the 
Bukowina  in  his  brilliant  offensive  of  1916.  The 
Italians  took  Gorizia  and  pushed  a  short  distance  east- 
ward of  the  Isonzo  toward  Trieste.  But  they  were 
fighting  on  their  own  soil  when  the  war  ended. 
Bulgaria's  territory  remained  intact  up  to  within  a 
day  or  two  of  the  Bulgarian  armistice. 

Foch  didn't  have  a  chance  to  unify  Allied  policy 
until  July,  1918.  He  was  eclectic  in  his  strategy.  He 
could  afford  to  be  so.  By  the  time  he  got  ready  to 
attack  he  had  an  unlimited  strategic  reserve  in  sight. 
He  could  assume  the  offensive  on  all  fronts  without 
risk.  This  he  did  in  a  most  brilliant  and  skilful  man- 
ner. The  final  Allied  campaign  was  marked  by  extra- 
ordinary confidence  and  energy.  It  aimed  at  the 
destruction  of  all  the  enemy  armies  in  the  field.  And 
those  armies,  one  and  all,  surrendered  in  order  to  escape 
destruction.  Foch's  generalship  from  July  18th  on 
was  without  a  flaw.  He  realized  the  original  French 
conception  of  "destroying  the  principal  enemy." 
Simultaneously  he  destroyed  the  subsidiary  enemies. 

Before  he  became  commander-in-chief,  however, 
Allied  strategy  remained  rudimentary.  Equally  with 
the  German,  Allied  strategical  preconceptions  were 
upset  by  the  unforeseen  developments  of  the  war. 
But  since  Allied  policy  was  limited  in  the  main  to  a 


t  18    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

four-year  effort  to  eject  the  Germans  from  France,  ii 
never  suffered,  as  German  policy  did,  from  the  tempta- 
tion to  adhere  slavishly  to  pre-war  plans  which  experi- 
ence kept  showing  to  be  impracticable. 

The  Allies  were  guilty  of  many  glaring  faults  in  the 
conduct  of  the  war.  As  has  been  pointed  out,  disper- 
sion of  command  was  one  of  these.  Diplomatic  and 
military  mismanagement  in  the  Balkans  was  another. 
The  Entente  was  chargeable  with  one  very  damaging 
strategic  blunder — the  failure  to  effect  a  contact  be- 
tween the  Western  and  the  Russian  fronts.  But  it 
made  no  such  flagrant  and  irreparable  error  as  Germany 
did  when  she  ran  amuck  with  the  U-boat. 

Speaking  broadly,  the  strategy  of  neither  side  was 
clearly  thought  out  or  shrewdly  accommodated  to 
the  vicissitudes  of  the  military  situation.  Germany 
profited  immensely  by  blunders  of  omission  on  the 
part  of  the  Allies.  She  lost  the  war  because  she  was 
capable  of  a  blunder  of  commission  more  unpardonable 
than  any  of  theirs. 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE   FIRST   MARNE 

There  was  no  "Miracle  of  the  Marne."  The  first 
battle  of  that  name  bulks  large  in  the  history  of  the 
war  because  of  the  dramatic  glamour  and  moral  value 
of  the  French  victory.  There  has  been  a  natural  tend- 
ency to  rhapsodize  about  it.  It  has  been  frequently 
classified  as  one  of  the  decisive  battles  of  the  world — 
along  with  Marathon,  Chalons,  Poitiers,  Waterloo, 
and  Gettysburg. 

Yet  we  see  now  that  it  was  not  decisive  in  any  positive 

sense.     It  was  a  battle  of  arrest.     It  merely  postponed 

a  decision.    It  did  not  break  the  German  hold  on  France. 

For  after  the  retreat  to  the  Aisne  the  German  armies 

still  threatened  Paris.     They  were  to  remain  on  French 

soil  for  more  than  four  years,  to  reach  and  pass  the 

Marne  again,  and  to  penetrate  once  more  almost  to 

Amiens.     Paris  escaped  bombardment  in   19 14.     But 

the  German  heavy  guns  were  almost  in  a  position  to 

destroy  it  in  June  and  July,  1918. 

Joflre's  victory  has  been  pictured  as  the  result  of  an 

119 


120    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

almost  supernatural  effort  on  the  part  of  beaten,  re- 
treating, shaken  Allied  troops.  Spirit  has  been  repre- 
sented as  triumphing  in  some  mysterious  ecstatic  way 
over  brute  force.  In  his  interesting  study  of  the  first 
battle  of  the  Marne,  Louis  Madelin,  a  French  historian, 
has  said: 

In  contact  with  the  soil  from  which  France  took 
her  existence,  Frenchmen  will  discover  in  themselves 
superhuman  strength,  like  Antaeus,  the  giant  in  the 
fable,  who  became  invincible  every  time  Hercules 
allowed  him  to  embrace  his  Mother,  the  Earth.  And, 
verily,  I  seem  to  see  on  September  5th  a  giant  sud- 
denly reinvigorated,  firmly  set  with  obstinate  front 
against  the  invader,  his  elbows  resting  securely  on 
the  camps  of  Paris  and  Verdun. 

There  was  an  element  of  the  super-heroic  in  the 
French  stand  below  the  Marne  after  the  long  retreat 
from  the  north-eastern  frontier.  But  that  stand  could 
not  have  been  made  if  the  retreat  had  not  been  in  the 
true  sense  a  "strategic  retirement,"  conducted  with 
admirable  skill  and  finally  leading  the  Germans  into  a 
trap. 

At  the  time  the  retirement  and  its  purpose  were  mis- 
understood— nowhere  more  completely  than  at  German 
Grand  Headquarters.  All  that  the  world  in  general 
could  see  was  that  the  French  had  failed  to  check  the 
German  invasion  and  that  the  German  masses  were 


The  First  Marne  121 

pouring  down  through  Belgium  and  Northern  France, 
almost  unmolested,  toward  Paris.  The  French  Govern- 
ment transferred  its  headquarters  to  Bordeaux.  There 
was  a  rush  to  get  away  from  the  threatened  capital. 
The  friends  of  the  Allied  cause  were  in  despair. 

Then  Joffre's  trap  was  sprung.  Despair  changed  to 
hysterical  elation.  The  Germans  drew  back  from  below 
the  Marne,  not  so  much  because  they  were  beaten  in 
the  field,  but  because  they  found  themselves  in  an 
impossible  position  strategically.  Still  under  the  spell 
of  a  tremendous  emotional  reaction,  the  Allied  publics 
accepted  an  exaggerated  view  of  the  German  failure. 
Legends  of  the  Marne  began  to  be  created.  There  is 
the  legend,  for  instance,  of  the  marshes  of  St.  Gond, 
in  which  the  Prussian  Guard  was  supposed  to  have 
been  engulfed,  as  the  Russians  were  in  the  marshes  at 
Tannenberg.     But  as  M.  Madelin  himself  says: 

The  marshes  are  not  what  legend  (for  there  is 
already  a  legend  of  the  Marne)  have  made  them  to 
be.  No  one  stuck  in  the  quagmire,  for  during  those 
months  such  a  thing  would  be  impossible.  After  a 
very  hot  summer  and  in  spite  of  slight  rains,  they 
were  like  a  dry  river-bed,  in  which  reeds  and  grasses 
grew  out  of  the  grey,  cracked  earth.  The  Prussian 
Guard  are  forced  to  fight  there,  exposed  to  our  artil- 
lery, and  though  they  do  not  actually  stick  there,  as 
romantic  writers  have  described,  they  suffer  heavily 
from  our  deadly  fire. 


122    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

In  dealing  with  the  First  Marne  the  Germans  went 
to  the  other  extreme.  They  refused  for  a  long  time  to 
discuss  the  battle,  or  even  to  mention  it.  Their  com- 
muniques of  September,  19 14,  made  no  direct  allusion 
to  the  fighting  on  the  Ourcq,  on  the  Petit  Morin  and 
Grand  Morin,  about  Fere  Champenoise,  on  the  Ornin 
and  the  Aire,  or  east  of  Nancy.  The  very  word  Marne 
was  taboo  to  the  German  public.  And  it  remained  so 
until  near  the  end  of  the  war. 

In  1 91 5  the  German  General  Staff  began  the  publica- 
tion of  a  series  of  descriptions  of  the  operations  in  the 
field,  for  the  instruction  of  German  readers.  It  was 
called  Kriegsberichte  ans  dem  Grossen  Hauptquartier,  and 
comprised  some  twenty-five  or  thirty  small  volumes, 
in  paper  covers,  each  dealing  with  a  separate  campaign 
or  battle.  The  first  one  covered  the  siege  of  Maubeuge, 
the  French  frontier  fortress  which  fell  early  in  Septem- 
ber, 1 914.  The  second  one  covered  the  battle  of  Soissons, 
which  occurred  in  January,  1915.  Not  a  line,  not  a 
single  word,  was  given  to  the  Marne.  Only  in  191 7 
and  1 91 8  do  we  find  German  military  critics  freely 
admitting  the  fact  of  the  first  great  German  repulse  in 
France. 

In  his  Deductions  from  the  World  War,  written  in 
191 7,  Lieutenant-General  Baron  Freytag-Loringhoven 
quotes  Herr  Stegemann,  a  pro-German  Swiss  military 


The  First  Marne  123 

critic,  who  wrote  a  book  about  the  Marne  campaign. 
Freytag-Loringhoven  says: 

If  at  that  time  (in  August,  1914)  no  decisive 
victory  fell  to  our  share,  and  our  strength  proved 
insufficient  to  vanquish  France,  we  must  none  the 
less  consider  that  up  to  the  Marne  we  had  achieved 
enormous  things. 

"In  the  very  moment  of  accomplishment  the 
completion  of  the  battle  was  abandoned  for  far- 
reaching  general  reasons.  .  .  .  The  battle  was 
broken  off  by  the  German  Supreme  Command,  and, 
in  view  of  the  general  situation,  a  strategic  retreat 
to  a  new  line  was  ordered." 

This  is  the  judgment  of  a  neutral  writer  on  the 
battle  of  the  Marne,  and  certainly  it  would  have 
taken  very  little  to  turn  the  scale  so  that  victory 
might  have  fallen  to  us  and  a  retreat  been  avoided. 

Thus  in  Germany  the  Marne  at  last  attained  a  place 
in  military  history. 

The  victory  of  September  5th-9th  restored  a  situation 
which  the  French  General  Staff  had  almost  allowed  to 
get  beyond  its  control.  Joffre's  strategy  in  the  first 
weeks  of  the  war  proved  ineffective.  He  adhered 
firmly  to  the  idea  that  the  Germans  would  not  come 
through  Belgium  rapidly  or  in  great  force.  He  con- 
centrated the  great  part  of  his  available  strength  on 
the  Lorraine-Alsace  front  and  held  the  Belgian  frontier 
lightly.     His  plan  was,  apparently,  to  match  a  German 


i  ^4    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

attack  through  Belgium  with  a  French  advance  toward 
the  Rhine.  He  sent  north  only  one  army,  the  Fifth, 
under  Lanrezac,  to  hold  the  triangle  from  Dinant  down 
the  Meuse  to  Namur,  and  thence  west  to  Charleroi. 
It  was  supported  on  the  left  by  a  part  of  the  British 
Expeditionary  Army. 

These  Allied  forces  were  never  able  to  make  a  junc- 
tion with  the  Belgian  army,  which  was  driven  north 
from  Brussels  in  the  direction  of  Antwerp.  They  were 
also  far  inferior  in  numbers  to  the  three  armies  of  Kluck, 
Biilow,  and  Hausen,  which  were  rapidly  moving  west 
through  Belgium.  z 

Joffre  expected  to  relieve  the  pressure  on  his  own  weak 
left  wing  by  striking  at  the  German  left  wing  from 
the  southern  edge  of  Belgium  down  to  the  Swiss  border. 
Possibly  he  never  expected  the  Germans  to  get  through 
Belgium  within  a  month.  He  cherefore  developed  a 
general  offensive  against  the  German  left,  beginning 
in  southern  Alsace.  An  army  from  Belfort  pushed 
across  the  border,  taking  Altkirch  on  August  8th.  The 
next  day  it  occupied  Mulhouse.  It  was  promptly 
expelled  from  Mulhouse  by  the  Germans.  This  city 
was  retaken  by  General  Pau  on  August  19th.  But 
the  second  upper  Alsace  invasion  came  abruptly  to  an 
end  when  the  French  were  defeated  farther  north  in 
Lorraine. 


The  First  Marne  125 

Two  armies  under  de  Castelnau  and  Dubail,  moving 
east  from  Nancy,  entered  the  Saar  Valley,  to  the  south 
of  Metz,  about  August  12th.  They  made  progress  for 
several  days,  crossing  the  Metz-Strasbourg  railroad, 
about  eighteen  miles  east  of  the  frontier.  Here  they 
were  beaten,  in  the  battles  of  Sarrebourg  and  Mor- 
hange,  by  two  German  armies,  the  one  under  the  Crown 
Prince  of  Bavaria  and  the  other  under  General  Heerin- 
gen.  By  August  23d  the  Germans  were  across  the 
French  line  and  threatening  Nancy. 

The  third  offensive  was  intrusted  to  the  Fourth 
Army,  under  General  de  Langle  de  Cary,  supported  on 
the  right  by  the  Third  Army,  under  General  Ruffey, 
and  the  special  army  of  Lorraine,  under  General  Mau- 
noury.  These  forces  amounted  to  thirty-one  divisions, 
or  about  six  hundred  thousand  men.  They  were  to 
operate  on  a  front  from  Metz  north  to  Dinant.  Op- 
posed to  them  were  the  Fifth,  Fourth,  and  Third  Ger- 
man armies,  under  the  Crown  Prince  of  Prussia,  the 
Grand  Duke  of  Wurttemberg,  and  General  Hausen, 
respectively.  These  armies  comprised  twenty-nine 
and  one  half  divisions,  and  were  slightly  inferior, 
except  in  artillery,  to  the  French. 

The  German  High  Command  was  already  executing 
an  envelopment  against  the  French  left  wing,  pivoting 
the  movement  on  Metz.     This  might  have  been  disar- 


126    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

ranged  by  a  successful  French  attack  along  the  Belgian 
frontier,  east  of  Sedan.  De  Langle  de  Cary's  Fourth 
Army  was,  therefore,  ordered  to  move  into  the  Ardennes 
Forest,  with  Neufchateau  as  its  first  objective.  But 
the  Ardennes  is  an  exceedingly  difficult  country  to 
fight  in.  The  Fourth  Army  got  tangled  up  in  the 
forest.  Its  movements  were  badly  co-ordinated.  Only 
a  small  number  of  its  divisions  were  properly  utilized, 
and  they  were  defeated  in  an  engagement  known  as 
the  battle  of  Neufchateau.  Ruffey's  Third  Army  was 
also  beaten  at  Virton,  on  the  extreme  southern  Belgian 
border.  The  most  ambitious  of  Joffre's  offensives 
failed  completely  and  the  three  armies  engaged  in  it 
retreated  to  and  beyond  the  Meuse. 

The  reverse  at  Neufchateau  imperilled  the  Fifth 
French  Army  holding  the  Dinant-Namur-Charleroi 
right  angle.  Hausen's  army  now  joined  with  Billow's 
and  Kluck's  in  the  swing  to  the  west  through  Belgium. 
The  Allied  left  wing — the  British  on  the  outer  edge  of  it 
— was  overlapped,  and  the  retreat  to  the  Marne  began. 

The  British  Expeditionary  Army,  numbering  only 
about  seventy  thousand  men,  suddenly  found  itself  out- 
flanked by  part  of  the  German  Second  Army  and  all 
of  the  German  First  Army.  Sir  John  French  even 
lost  touch  for  a  while  with  Lanrezac.  His  only  safety 
lay  in  a  hurried  retirement.     And  Lanrezac  had  begun 


The  First  Marne  127 

to  retreat  before  he  did.  Once  the  German  campaign 
of  envelopment — planned  by  Count  Schlieffen — -got 
under  full  head  the  whole  French  plan  of  offence  and 
defence  went  glimmering.  Joffre  could  not  hope  to 
make  a  successful  stand  until  he  had  found  a  tenable 
line  and  had  completely  regrouped  his  armies. 

The  French  General  Staff  sought  later  to  construct 
a  reasonable  explanation  of  the  initial  defeats,  which 
had  left  all  of  Northeastern  France  open  to  the  enemy. 
This  explanation  is  paraphrased  by  Joseph  Reinach — 
the  "Polybe"  of  Le  Figaro — in  his  La  Guerre  sur  le 
Front  Occidental.     He  says: 

On  the  one  hand,  divisions  were  thrown  too 
quickly  under  the  enemy's  fire.  The  men  and  cer- 
tain chiefs,  in  this  first  great  encounter,  carried 
boldness  to  the  point  of  excess.  An  ignorance  of  the 
conditions  of  war  was  manifested  in  a  contempt, 
pushed  to  defiance,  of  danger  and  death.  On  the 
other  hand,  weaknesses  were  disclosed.  Some  com- 
manders proved  themselves  real  leaders  in  battle. 
Others  lost  their  reputations,  sometimes  deserved,  but 
for  other  qualities  than  those  of  action,  which  is  some- 
thing else  than  science.  Finally  there  were  errors,  both 
in  the  employment  of  infantry  and  in  that  of  artillery. 
And  the  liaison  between  them  was  insufficient. 

Every  French  military  critic  has  also  testified  to 
the  fact  that  in  the  early  part  of  the  war  the  French 
heavy  artillery  was  vastly  inferior  to  the  German. 


128    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

But  these  explanations  do  not  cover  the  whole  ground. 
It  is  clear  that  the  French  mobilization  was  badly 
planned  in  that  it  did  not  provide  sufficient  protection 
against  an  attack  coming  through  Belgium.  Even 
after  the  strength  of  the  German  movement  across 
Belgium  began  to  be  disclosed,  Joffre  continued  to 
minimize  it  and  neglected  to  reinforce  his  threatened 
left  wing.  The  French  commander-in-chief  had  seri- 
ously underestimated  the  German  strength,  both  in 
the  north  and  in  the  south.  He  had  actually  played 
into  the  enemy's  hand  by  developing  his  abortive 
Alsace-Lorraine  and  Ardennes  offensives. 

Joffre's  reputation  as  a  soldier  will  rest  on  the  cool- 
ness with  which  he  faced  the  results  of  his  own  mis- 
calculations. He  had  to  deal  with  a  heart-breaking 
situation  in  the  last  days  of  August,  1914.  But  he 
didn't  lose  courage.  He  determined  to  repair  his  errors. 
He  realized  that  he  would  have  to  surrender  at  once  a 
considerable  portion  of  Northern  France.  He  saw  that 
the  German  advance  couldn't  well  be  halted  short  of 
Paris.  Had  he  been  a  leader  of  inferior  mould  he 
would  have  done  what  Ludendorff  did  after  the  Second 
Marne.  He  would  have  organized  a  defence  on  the 
line  of  the  Oise  or  the  Somme — or  at  the  La  Fere-Laon- 
Rheims  barrier. 

He  showed  his  real  quality  by  deciding  to  put  aside 


The  First  Marne  129 

all  half-way  measures,  to  allow  the  German  envelop- 
ment movement  to  run  its  course  and  not  to  venture  a 
battle  until  he  could  deliver  it  under  really  favourable 
conditions.  He  still  had  the  utmost  faith  in  his  armies 
and  he  never  gave  over  the  idea  of  renewing  the  offen- 
sive. He  retreated  with  a  clear  strategic  purpose  in 
view,  although  the  puffed-up  German  High  Command 
credited  him  merely  with  a  desire  to  escape  punishment. 
Thus,  he  wrote  on  August  25th,  when  the  retirement 
began : 

The  proposed  offensive  movement  not  being 
possible,  ulterior  operations  will  be  effected  by  the 
addition  of  the  Fourth  and  Fifth  Corps  of  the  British 
and  fresh  forces  taken  from  our  eastern  area,  so  as 
to  form  on  our  left  a  mass  capable  of  taking  the  offensive 
while  the  other  armies  will  hold  the  attacks  of  the 
enemy  in  check  for  the  time  required. 

Again,  on  August  27th,  he  wrote  to  General  de  Langle 
de  Cary: 

I  see  nothing  against  your  remaining  until  to- 
morrow, the  28th,  in  order  to  consolidate  your  success 
and  show  that  our  withdrawal  is  purely  strategic; 
but  on  the  29th  every  one  must  retreat. 

The  Allied  publics  were  puzzled  and  dismayed  by  the 
rapidity  of  the  Allied  withdrawal  from  Northeastern 
France.     The  British,  on  the  extreme  left,  who  were 


130    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

most  exposed  to  Kluck's  turning's  movement,  retreated 
for  five  days  and  nights  with  hardly  a  pause.  Then, 
south  of  the  Somme,  the  Allied  left  wing  was  measur- 
ably out  of  peril.  But  Joffre  was  not  ready  to  give 
battle  on  the  Somme,  the  Oise,  or  the  Aisne.  So  the 
general  retirement  continued  four  days  longer,  until 
the  French  left  wing  rested  on  the  fortified  zone  of 
Paris. 

The  Germans  were  also  unable  to  understand  why 
the  Allies  didn't  turn  and  fight.  Kluck  said  in 
November,  191 8,  that  he  expected  an  obstinate  resist- 
ance on  his  front  after  the  battles  of  Mons  and  Charle- 
roi.  Instead  he  had  difficulty  in  keeping  in  touch  with 
the  retreating  Allied  forces.  The  German  High  Com- 
mand was  thrown  off  its  balance  by  the  appearance 
of  French  and  British  disorganization.  It  jumped  to 
the  conclusion  that  it  was  on  the  verge  of  a  repetition 
of  the  elder  Moltke's  easy  successes  in  1870.  It  already 
saw  France  vanquished  and  the  black,  white,  and  red 
standard  floating  from  the  Eiffel  Tower. 

Overconfidence  made  the  German  General  Staff 
incautious.  It  had  no  thought  of  a  renewal  of  the 
French  offensive.  It  allowed  the  German  columns  to 
outtravel  their  heavier  artillery  and  their  transport. 
The  Germans  were  marching  away  from  their  bases. 
The  French  were  retiring  toward  theirs.     Nor  did  the 


The  First  Marne  131 

German  Staff  appear  to  be  aware  that  from  September 
1st  on  the  strategical  situation  was  changing  rapidly 
in  favour  of  the  French. 

The  Schlieffen  envelopment  which  Kluck  and  Biilow 
were  charged  with  executing  was  feasible  enough  so 
long  as  the  Allied  left  wing  remained  "in  the  air."  It 
did  remain  so  while  the  British  were  north  of  the  Oise. 
Kluck's  right  then  overreached  the  Allied  left.  His 
outposts  entered  Amiens.  Most  of  his  troops  came 
down  to  the  Oise  crossings  to  the  west  of  Compiegne. 
There  were  no  Allied  troops  in  that  region  to  stop 
them. 

But  when  they  approached  the  fortified  zone  of 
Paris  conditions  altered.  The  German  right  wing 
armies  could  not  invest  Paris.  For  the  German  ob- 
jective was  not  Paris,  but  the  French  armies.  They 
could  not  isolate  or  mask  Paris  by  passing  around 
it  on  the  west.  Kluck's  army  was  not  large  enough 
for  such  an  operation,  lie  may  have  thought  that 
Paris  would  be  evacuated  by  its  garrison,  as  it  had 
been  by  the  French  Government.  After  he  reached 
the  north-eastern  outskirts  of  the  capital  and  found  no 
sign  of  evacuation  he  conceived  the  idea  of  merely 
skirting  Paris  and  turning  south-east  in  pursuit  of  the 
British,  who  had  retreated  across  the  Grand  Morin  to 
a  position  below  Coulommiers.     Possibly  he  expected 


132    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

to  occupy  Paris  after  the  Allies  had  been  driven  south 
of  the  Seine. 

The  painfully  meagre  French  bulletins  in  the  last 
days  of  August  and  the  first  days  of  September  merely 
disclosed  an  uninterrupted  retreat.  Sedan  Day  was 
at  hand.  The  world  looked  forward  to  another  Sedan. 
Yet  it  was  becoming  apparent  even  then  that  the  Ger- 
man envelopment  movement  had  failed.  On  Septem- 
ber 4th,  two  days  before  the  date  on  which  Joffre  was 
planning  to  begin  his  new  offensive,  I  wrote  in  an 
article,  published  in  the  New  York  Tribune  of  September 
5th: 

From  the  point  of  view  of  strategy  the  French 
position  is  by  no  means  desperate.  An  inferior 
force  could  hold  it  against  a  superior  one,  and  from 
it  an  equal  or  superior  force  could  deal  a  fatal  blow 
at  an  over-extended  enemy. 

That  was  before  Maunoury's  flanking  movement 
east  of  Paris  had  started.     On  September  6th  I  wrote: 

The  German  turning  movement,  which  appar- 
ently aimed  at  getting  between  the  Allied  forces  and 
Paris  at  some  point  north-north-east  of  the  capital 
failed  of  its  purpose  when  the  Allies  retreated  so  far 
that  their  extreme  left  wing  rested  on  the  Paris  forts. 
Now  the  turning  army  has  headed  east  and  away 
from  Paris,  probably  for  the  purpose  of  helping  to 
deliver  a  converging  attack  on  the  Allied  centre. 


The  First  Marne  133 

Again,  on  September  8th,  when  only  meagre  reports 
had  reached  the  United  States  of  the  developments 
east  of  Paris,  I  said  {Tribune  of  September  9th) : 

The  weakness  of  the  German  position  is  that  it 
is  now  outflanked  on  the  right,  from  which  direction 
the  Allies  are  attacking  von  Kluck  and  trying  to  get 
into  his  rear.  If  the  Allies  can  hold  along  their 
curved-back  left  centre  the  situation  will  be  very 
favourable  to  them  from  the  tactical  point  of  view, 
since  a  successful  flank  and  rear  attack  from  the 
direction  of  Meaux  would  cut  the  present  German 
communications  north  and  compel  a  hurried  retreat 
toward  Belgium  and  Luxemburg. 

The  German  First  Army  had,  in  fact,  been  placed 
in  what  Joffre  described  in  an  order  issued  by  him 
on  September  4th  as  "a  foolhardy  position."  It  had 
entered  the  French  trap.  It  was  exposed  to  an  attack 
out  of  Paris  by  an  army  whose  presence  in  that  neigh- 
bourhood the  German  Staff  did  not  suspect.  Joffre 
had  organized  the  Sixth  French  Army,  transferring 
Maunoury  from  the  Army  of  Lorraine  to  command  it. 
This  force  was  massed  behind  the  Paris  fortifications. 
It  advanced  east  of  Meaux  on  September  5th  to  attack 
Kluck's  flank  and  rear.  Another  new  army  had  been 
created  under  Foch  and  assigned  to  the  French  left 
centre. 

The  Allied  armies  on  September  6th  stood  in  this 


i34    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

order  from  Paris  to  Verdun:  The  Sixth,  under  Mau- 
noury,  on  the  Ourcq,  facing  east;  the  British  Ex- 
peditionary Army,  under  Sir  John  French,  below 
Coulommiers,  facing  north ;  the  Fifth  Army,  now  under 
Franchet  d'Esperey,  who  had  replaced  Lanrezac,  stretch- 
ing as  far  as  Sezanne;  the  Ninth,  under  Foch,  from 
Sezanne  to  Camp  de  Mailly;  the  Fourth,  under  de 
Langle  de  Cary,  from  Sompuis  to  Sermaize;  the  Third, 
under  Sarrail,  who  had  replaced  Ruffey,  bending  in 
a  sharp  angle  from  Revigny  to  Souilly.  Verdun  was 
held  by  its  permanent  garrison.  Opposite  the  Allies 
from  Coulommiers  to  Verdun  were  the  first  five  Ger- 
man armies,  under  Kluck,  Biilow,  Hausen,  the  Grand 
Duke  of  Wurttemberg,  and  the  Crown  Prince  of  Prus- 
sia. Kluck  had  left  only  a  single  reserve  corps  of 
forty  thousand  men  to  guard  his  rear  toward  Paris. 

Maunoury's  attack  on  this  corps  put  the  German 
First  Army  in  peril.  But  its  commander  extricated  it 
with  remarkable  skill.  He  had  been  caught  napping. 
He  pulled  free  by  daring  generalship.  Leaving  only  a 
fraction  of  his  army  confronting  Sir  John  French,  he 
hurried  the  rest  of  it  back  toward  the  Ourcq  and  suc- 
ceeded in  fighting  Maunoury  to  a  standstill.  On  Sep- 
tember 9th  he  had  bent  Maunoury's  left  wing  back 
toward  Paris.  But  the  next  day  he  was  in  full  retreat. 
His  own  retrograde  movement  had  dislocated  Billow's 


The  First  Marne  135 

line,  on  his  left.  And  Billow's  retirement  opened  the 
gap  still  further  east  through  which  Foch  drove  with 
part  of  the  Ninth  Army,  causing  the  defeat  and  hurried 
retirement  of  Hausen. 

Having  failed  absolutely  to  envelop  the  Allied  left 
the  German  High  Command  had  tried  a  "breaking 
through"  operation  in  the  centre.  Here  the  action  of 
La  Fere-Champenoise  was  fought,  in  which  Foch,  with 
help  from  d'Esperey,  held  on  grimly  for  four  days 
against  German  attacks,  and  on  the  fourth  turned 
and  routed  the  enemy. 

As  a  battle  the  First  Marne  has  many  confusing 
features.  It  represented  a  French  counter-offensive. 
Yet  throughout  the  greater  part  of  it  the  French  fought 
on  the  defensive.  Of  the  five  French  armies  only  two 
were  used  to  the  limit — the  Sixth  and  the  Ninth.  The 
British  hardly  fought  at  all.  On  the  German  side 
only  two  of  the  five  armies,  Kluck's  and  Hausen's, 
were  fully  engaged. 

Moreover,  Joffre's  strategical  plans  were  frustrated. 
An  exceptional  opportunity  was  lost  through  lack  of 
close  co-operation  between  Maunoury  and  Sir  John 
French  and  by  the  latter's  failure  to  contain  a  larger 
part  of  Kluck's  forces  below  the  Marne.  The  envelop- 
ment which  Joffre  attempted  was  only  a  halfway  suc- 
cess.    Faults  in  the  execution  of  his  orders  prevented 


136    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War    v 

him  from  taking  advantage  of  "the  foolhardy  position" 
of  the  German  First  Army. 

Considerations  of  this  sort  prompted  the  Germans 
to  minimize  their  defeat  at  the  Marne  and  even  to 
deny  defeat  there.  The  battle  for  them  was  one  of 
extrication  from  a  predicament  due  to  their  own  heed- 
lessness and  overconfidence.  They  accomplished  the 
strategical  extrication  at  which  they  aimed.  They 
were  beaten  in  the  field  at  only  one  or  two  points. 
Their  losses  were  probably  less  than  those  of  the  Allies. 
Virtually  no  German  prisoners  or  guns  were  taken. 

The  German  armies  on  the  right  wing  retreated 
thirty  miles  or  more.  But  they  were  able  to  stop  at 
the  Aisne  and  to  make  good  their  grip  on  Northern 
France.  This  is  the  sort  of  case  made  out  for  the  drawn 
battle  view  of  the  Marne  which  was  held  by  most 
German  critics  and  by  pro-German  neutrals,  like  the 
Swiss  critic,   Stegemann. 

This  view,  however,  fails  to  take  into  account  both 
the  extraordinary  moral  and  the  substantial  military 
consequences  of  the  German  defeat.  The  Marne 
restored  Allied  confidence.  France  and  Great  Britain 
needed  time  to  develop  their  strength.  The  German 
failure  in  the  Marne  campaign  pointed  to  a  long  war. 
And  a  long  war  was  to  the  advantage  of  the  Western 
Allies.     Germany  counted  on  the  Cannae  which  Schlief- 


The  First  Marne  *37 

fen  had  planned.  But  there  was  to  be  in  the  west 
no  German  Cann^e-no  Sedan,  no  Vionville,  Gravelotte, 
or  St.  Privat.  France  had  not  been  lost.  But  the 
world  continued  to  think  mistakenly  that  some  im- 
penetrable "Miracle  of  the  Marne"  had  saved  her. 

In  the  military  sense  the  German  High  Command 
had  bungled  its  initial  offensive  of  the  war  only  less 
startlingly  than  Joffre  had  bungled  his.  The  Germans 
were  left  with  some  substantial  evidences  of  success  in 
their  hands,  having  acquired  an  immensely  valuable 
foothold  in  Belgium  and  France.  But  they  suffered 
a  tremendous  loss  in  military  prestige.  Their  offensive 
came  to  grief  under  circumstances  so  painful  that  by 
common  consent,  both  at  the  front  and  in  the  rear, 
they  were  made  the  object  of  a  German  conspiracy  01 

silence.     - 

Freytag-Loringhoven  says  in  his  Deductions  from  the 
World  War  that  the  German  High  Command  didn't 
have  sufficient  forces  to  carry  through  Schlieffen's 
envelopment  plan.  He  argues  that  another  German 
army  should  have  been  organized,  "disposed  in  echelon 
behind  the  German  right  wing. ' '  That  is  to  say,  Kluck 
should  have  been  supported  at  the  Marne  by  an  addi- 
tional German  army  which  would  have  taken  care  of 
any  attack  coming  east  out  of  Paris.  Yet  the  German 
High   Command  had  many   disengaged  troops.     The 


i38    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

idea  of  using  them  to  extend  the  German  right  never 
occurred  to  it. 

Moreover,  Count  Schlieffen's  plan  also  called  for  an 
envelopment  of  the  French  right  in  Lorraine.  This 
part  of  the  programme  never  came  to  anything.  The 
German  armies  on  the  Lorraine  border  were  defeated 
decisively  by  Dubail  and  de  Castelnau  at  the  same 
time  that  the  armies  which  had  pivoted  from  Metz 
were  being  defeated  between  Paris  and  Verdun. 

The  Marne  campaign  showed  that  the  German 
military  machine  in  1914  was  not  what  it  was  in  1870- 
71.  It  could  crack  on  occasion.  The  Germans  had 
broken  into  Belgium  and  Northern  France  with  extra- 
ordinary ease.  But  they  could  not  "steam  roller" 
their  way  to  Paris.  They  would  now  have  to  fight  to 
stay  where  they  were — to  hold  the  line  of  the  Aisne  east 
to  Verdun,  and  to  extend  that  line  up  to  the  North  Sea. 

In  spite  of  the  check  below  the  Marne  the  German 
position  in  France  in  mid-September,  19 14,  was  still 
advantageous  and  formidable.  But  in  comparison 
with  what  it  might  have  been  it  seemed  fettered  and 
unpromising.  The  discouragement  which  prevailed  at 
German  Grand  Headquarters  after  the  retreat  to  the 
Aisne,  and  which  forecast  the  younger  Moltke's  retire- 
ment, was  a  fair  measure  of  the  shock  to  German  hopes 
involved  in  Joffre's  sensational  "come  back"  victory. 


CHAPTER  VIII 


THE    BATTLE   OF    FLANDERS 


With  the  Allied  publics  the  emotional  reaction  to 
the  first  battle  of  the  Marne  was  so  prodigious  as  to 
obscure  its  actual  military  results.  JofTre  was  heroized. 
Yet  from  the  military  point  of  view  what  he  had  done 
was  only  to  repair  in  part  the  errors  he  had  committed 
in  the  opening  weeks  of  the  war.  He  had  skilfully 
taken  advantage  of  mistakes  on  the  German  side 
comparable  to  his  own. 

While  he  remained  commander-in-chief  of  the  French 
armies  French  writers  continued  to  take  a  complacent 
view  of  his  strategy.  Gabriel  Hanotaux,  historian  and 
former  Minister  of  Foreign  Affairs,  who  has  written 
brilliantly  and  voluminously  about  the  war,  reflects 
that  view.  He  insists  that  Joffre's  plan  of  operations 
was  adequate  from  the  start.  This  judgment  is  based 
on  the  assumption  that  the  French  commander-in- 
chief  achieved  his  general  purpose,  which  was  to 
prevent  the  envelopment  of  the  French  armies  under- 
taken by  the  younger   Moltke,    according   to    Count 

139 


Ho    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Schlieffen's  plans.  "The  German  armies,"  says  Hano- 
taux,  in  an  appreciation  of  Joffre,  "did  not  turn  the 
French  armies,  which  was  their  objective.  On  the 
contrary,  they  were  enveloped  themselves." 

But  this  pleasing  theory  leaves  out  of  account  what 
happened  before  Kluck  heedlessly  plunged  into  the 
trap  set  for  him  east  of  Paris.  After  1916  French 
opinion  began  to  measure  more  accurately  the  conse- 
quences of  Joffre 's  blunders  in  August,  1914.  In 
volume  iii.  of  his  La  Grande  Guerre  sur  le  Front  Occiden- 
tal (written  in  191 7  and  published  in  191 8),  General 
Palat  (Pierre  Lehautcourt)  thus  answers  M.  Hano- 
taux's  argument: 

The  (French)  offensive  in  Belgium,  on  the  Sambre 
and  in  the  Ardennes,  lasted  from  August  21st  to 
August  23d.  After  August  24th  we  were  everywhere 
in  full  retreat.  The  national  territory  was  violated  in 
several  directions.  And  on  the  evening  of  the  25th 
we  had  already  allowed  the  enemy  to  occupy  a 
zone — very  important  because  of  its  extent,  its 
wealth,  and  its  population — of  that  France  so  pa- 
tiently formed  by  the  labour  of  so  many  generations. 
By  September  5th  our  armies  were  thrown  south  of 
the  Marne,  and  it  was  a  question  of  carrying  them 
south  of  the  Seine.  Paris  was  uncovered  and  at  the 
mercy  of  the  German  armies,  and  the  government 
had  been  transferred  to  Bordeaux. 

How  can  we  admire  a  strategy  whose  results  still 
weigh  upon  us  after  four  years  of  the  most  frightful 


The  Battle  of  Flanders  141 

war,  abounding  in  sacrifices  of  every  sort?  We  shall 
not  cease  to  repeat  what  many  others,  who  have 
closely  observed  the  course  of  events,  also  think. 
The  reverses  of  the  beginning  of  the  war  would  never 
have  been  produced  in  all  their  terrible  amplitude 
had  it  not  been  for  initial  errors  committed  in  the 
plan  of  concentration  as  well  as  in  the  plan  of  opera- 
tions adopted  by  our  High  Command. 

That  concentration  was  made  at  first  exclusively 
on  the  Franco-German  frontier,  in  spite  of  so  many 
signs  which  indicated  the  violation  of  Belgian  ter- 
ritory. The  High  Command  long  persisted  in  its 
error,  in  place  of  repairing  it  with  the  promptitude 
which  circumstance  demanded.  It  even  had  the  idea 
of  undertaking — twice  in  Alsace  and  then  in  Lor- 
raine— parasitic  offensives  which  it  knew  couldn't 
lead  to  anything,  even  under  favourable  conditions. 
Finally,  after  having  half  way  overcome  the  bulk  of 
the  faults  committed  in  the  concentration,  it  launched 
tardily  in  Belgium  a  counter-offensive  which  was  to 
be  attempted  against  forces  more  considerable  than 
ours  and  whose  success,  in  the  circumstances,  was 
assuredly  impossible.  How  can  we  applaud  strategic 
dispositions  so  scattering,  which  ended  finally, 
after  our  pretending  to  impose  our  will  on  the  enemy, 
in  his  will  being  imposed  on  us? 

Impressive  and  inspiring  as  the  victory  of  the  Marne 
was,  it  could  not  restore  an  equilibrium  on  the  Western 
Front.  It  could  not  expunge  the  consequences  of  the 
earlier  French  failure.  Within  ten  days  after  the  battle 
the  Allies  found  out  that  they  were  not  on  the  road 


i42    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

to  recover  the  valuable  industrial  districts  of  North- 
eastern France.  They  also  discovered  that  they  had 
not  even  wrested  the  offensive  out  of  the  hands  of  the 
Germans. 

Kluck  stopped  on  the  Aisne  above  Soissons.  Bulow 
halted  a  little  north  of  Rheims.  They  both  were 
counter-attacking  about  September  1 8th.  Further  east, 
in  the  Argonne  region,  the  armies  of  the  Grand  Duke  of 
Wurttemberg  and  the  Crown  Prince  of  Prussia  pressed 
south  again  a  considerable  distance.  South  of  Verdun 
a  German  force  from  Metz  took  Fort  Camp  des  Romains 
and  St.  Mihiel,  on  the  Meuse,  creating  the  famous  St. 
Mihiel  salient,  which  remained  invulnerable  until  the 
Americans  suddenly  wiped  it  off  the  map  in  one  day 
in  September,  1918. 

After  September  20,  1914,  the  chief  problem  for 
both  armies  in  the  West  was  to  link  up  the  front  north- 
east of  Paris  with  the  Belgian  front.  For  Great  Brit- 
ain as  well  as  for  France  it  was  imperative  to  cover 
the  Channel  ports,  which  were  to  serve  as  the  chief 
bases  of  the  British  Expeditionary  Forces.  It  was 
equally  important  for  the  Germans,  giving  over  for  the 
present  their  dream  of  capturing  the  French  capital,  to 
round  out  their  occupation  of  Belgium,  take  Antwerp, 
establish  themselves  on  the  North  Sea  coast  of  Belgium, 
and,  if  possible,  to  seize  Dunkirk  and  Calais. 


The  Battle  of  Flanders  H3 

Joffre  made  the  first  move  in  the  so-called  "race 
for  the  sea"  by  extending  his  left  wing  north  in  the 
direction  of  Amiens  and  compelling  Kluck  to  follow 
suit.  But  Joffre's  strategy  was  defensive  rather  than 
offensive  in  character.  He  was  seeking  to  get  north 
chiefly  to  protect  the  Channel  bases  and  to  extricate 
the  Belgian  army,  which  was  about  to  be  penned  up 
in  Antwerp. 

Antwerp  was  again  to  demonstrate  the  vulnerability 
of  the  old-fashioned  fortress.  As  soon  as  the  German 
position  on  the  Aisne  was  stabilized  Moltke  turned  his 
attention  to  the  isolated  Belgian  forces  which  had 
retired  from  Brussels  to  Antwerp  about  the  middle  of 
August.  The  Germans  in  Belgium  were  still  well  south 
of  the  Scheldt  River,  holding  the  line  of  the  Meuse 
and  the  line  through  Brussels  to  Mons.  King  Albert's 
troops  held  the  fortified  zone  about  Antwerp,  and  still 
had  an  avenue  of  retreat  west  along  the  north  bank  of 
the  Scheldt  to  Ghent,  Ostend,  and  French  Flanders. 
But  just  then  there  were  no  Allied  armies  in  that  region 
with  which  they  could  make  a  junction. 

Joffre  at  first  aimed  at  taking  St.  Quentin  and  threat- 
ening the  German  communications  with  Maubeuge. 
But  his  troops,  working  east  from  Amiens,  were  soon 
checked  by  Kluck.  They  lost  Roye,  Peronne,  and 
Bapaume,  and  were  crowded  back  to  the  line  of  Arras, 


144    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Lens,  and  La  Bassee.  Lille  was  recovered  for  a  brief 
period  and  then  lost  again.  Everywhere  the  Allies 
were  thrust  back  from  the  road  leading  to  Ghent  and 
Antwerp. 

The  "race  for  the  sea"  caused  a  complete  displace- 
ment of  the  original  distribution  of  forces  in  the  West. 
Both  sides  depleted  the  Alsace-Lorraine  front.  De 
Castelnau  was  transferred  to  Picardy;  Foch's  Ninth 
Army  and  the  British  Expeditionary  Army  were  sent 
to  Flanders.  Crown  Prince  Rupprecht's  Bavarian 
army  was  shifted  to  Belgium  and  remained  there  for 
the  next  four  years.  On  the  Alsace-Lorraine  border 
the  war  lapsed  into  a  trench  deadlock.  This  was  never 
interrupted  south  of  St.  Mihiel.  In  the  Meuse  region 
it  was  broken  only  once — by  the  long  drawn-out  battle  of 
Verdun.  Events  had  corrected  the  overconcentration 
of  the  French  on  the  Franco-German  boundary  and  vindi- 
cated, from  the  strictly  military  point  of  view,  the  German 
choice  of  Belgium  as  the  real  sally-port  into  France. 

By  the  end  of  September  it  was  evident  that  the 
French  and  British  armies  could  not  relieve  Antwerp. 
They  had  reached  the  neighbourhood  of  Lille  and 
Ypres.  But  they  had  been  barred  from  the  Scheldt 
Valley.  The  only  question  now  was  whether  they 
could  intervene  sufficiently  to  extricate  the  Belgian 
army  still  in  Antwerp. 


The  Battle  of  Flanders  H5 

The  siege  of  the  great  Belgian  citadel  made  startling 
progress.  It  lasted  in  all  only  about  ten  days.  The 
Belgian  army  should  have  been  started  earlier  on  its 
retreat  to  Bruges  and  Ostend.  Its  departure  was 
delayed  by  an  ill-advised  attempt  on  the  part  of 
Winston  Churchill,  First  Lord  of  the  Admiralty  in  the 
Asquith  Cabinet,  to  prolong  the  defence.  He  visited 
Antwerp  and  then  sent  over  a  half-trained  British  naval 
brigade  to  reinforce  the  garrison.  The  elaborate  outer 
fortifications  proved  as  useless,  under  the  fire  of  the 
big  Krupp  and  Skoda  howitzers,  as  the  fortifications 
of  Liege,  Namur,  and  Maubeuge,  had  been.  The 
city  itself  was  shelled  on  October  7th.  It  surrendered 
on  October  9th,  the  remnant  of  the  garrison  retiring 
across  the  border  into  Holland. 

King  Albert's  army  was  hurried  in  its  retreat  and 
lost  a  division  on  the  way  to  Bruges,  the  Germans 
crossing  the  Scheldt  and  crowding  the  Belgian  rear- 
guard into  Dutch  territory.  Bruges  could  not  be  held. 
Neither  could  Ostend.  The  retiring  Belgians  were 
not  able  to  unite  with  the  French  and  British  until 
they  had  crossed  the  Yser  River  and  filled  the  gap  in 
the  Allied  line  between  Ypres  and  Nieuport. 

The  capture  of  Antwerp,  Bruges,  Ostend,  and  Zee- 
brugge  and  the  occupation  of  all  but  a  narrow  strip 
of  Belgian  territory  ended  the  second  phase  of  the  war 


i46    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

of  movement  in  the  western  field.  Fixed  trench  lines 
now  ran  from  the  Swiss  border  to  the  North  Sea.  The 
long  deadlock  of  the  war  of  positions  was  approaching. 
The  battle  of  the  Marne  had  interrupted  German 
progress  in  the  south.  But  it  had  not  sufficed  to  check 
it  in  the  north.  Allied  expectations  in  the  glow  of  the 
first  days  following  Joflre's  victory  had  not  been  re- 
alized. It  had  been  hoped  that  the  German  retreat 
from  the  Marne  would  continue  and  that  the  German 
hold  on  Northern  France  and  Belgium  would  be  shaken 
loose.  It  would  have  been  if  the  First  Marne  had  been 
a  decisive  battle  in  any  positive  sense. 

As  a  matter  of  fact  the  Allies  lost  ground,  instead 
of  gaining  it,  from  the  time  the  Germans  halted  at  the 
Aisne.  The  German  High  Command  regained  the 
strategical  offensive  in  the  latter  half  of  September 
and  retained  it  through  the  rest  of  1914.  It  frustrated 
the  main  purpose  of  Joflre's  northward  flanking  move- 
ment, which  was  to  manoeuvre  the  German  armies 
back  toward  the  Sambre  and  the  Meuse,  to  relieve 
Antwerp,  and  to  break  the  German  hold  on  Belgium. 
Joffre  was  trying  to  nullify  the  results  of  the  initial 
German  successes  in  the  north,  due  largely  to  his  own 
faulty  dispositions  and  movements  in  the  first  weeks 
of  the  war.  He  did  not  succeed  in  this.  On  the  con- 
trary, the  Germans  were  able  to  gather  the  full  fruits 


The  Battle  of  Flanders  H7 

of  these  early  successes,  overrunning  Western  Belgium, 
seizing  the  Belgian  North  Sea  harbours,  Lille,  Cambrai, 
Douai,  and  Lens,  destroying  Arras  and  threatening 
the  approaches  to  the  Channel  ports. 

The  Germans  were  able  to  exploit  the  military  ad- 
vantages accruing  from  their  first  onrush  into  Belgium 
largely  because  of  their  more  advanced  mobilization. 
In  August  they  had  put  about  1,500,000  men  into  the 
first  line  in  the  west.  The  French  were  then  little 
inferior  in  strength.  But  the  German  reserves  became 
available  more  quickly  and  in  larger  numbers.  Many 
newly  formed  German  divisions,  of  fairly  good  quality, 
were  rushed  into  Belgium.  In  October  and  Novem- 
ber German  superiority  in  man  power  became  pro- 
nounced. There  had  always  been  a  decided  superiority 
in  artillery,  in  machine  guns,  and  in  munitions. 

To  oppose  these  new  German  formations  the  Allies 
had  to  throw  in  a  strange  medley  of  reinforcements — 
French  marines,  Moroccans,  Algerians,  Senegalese, 
British  Sikhs,  and  other  East  Indian  contingents,  the 
first  Canadian  regiments,  and  English  territorials.  The 
Allied  line  was  thinnest  at  its  northern  end.  And 
against  this  end  the  next  German  offensive  on  a  grand 
scale  was  to  be  directed. 

Having  been  balked  in  the  first  drive  for  Paris,  the 
German  High  Command  conceived  the  idea  of  com- 


148    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

pensating  itself  by  a  drive  for  the  Channel  ports.  The 
conquest  of  Belgium  had  given  new  value  to  those  ports 
as  German  sea  bases.  Antwerp  now  furnished  a  head- 
quarters for  German  submarine  activities  within  easy 
range  of  the  English  Channel.  Napoleon  once  de- 
scribed Antwerp  as  "a  pistol  pointed  at  the  heart  of 
England."  This  was  a  rhetorical  exaggeration.  He 
was  never  able  to  load  or  discharge  the  pistol.  Nor 
would  Antwerp  have  been  of  any  special  value  to 
Germany  for  surface  naval  operations. 

But  the  submarine  had  now  startingly  demonstrated 
its  value.  From  the  day,  late  in  September,  19 14, 
when  Lieutenant  Weddigen,  commanding  the  U-9, 
sank  the  British  warships  Hogue,  Cressy,  and  Aboukir 
within  the  space  of  half  an  hour,  the  possibility  of  some 
offensive  action  against  England  had  begun  to  stir 
the  German  imagination.  The  main  British  fleet  was 
forced  to  retire  to  a  safe  distance  north  of  Scotland. 
The  protection  of  the  British  lines  of  communication 
across  the  Channel  to  Boulogne  and  Havre  was  left 
to  light  vessels.  To  destroy  those  communications, 
both  by  submarine  attack  and  by  pushing  along  the 
coast  to  Dunkirk,  Calais,  and  Boulogne,  would  not 
only  produce  consternation  in  England,  but  would 
gravely  compromise  the  Allied  position  in  Northern 
France. 


The  Battle  of  Flanders  149 

The  Germans  also  intended  to  use  the  submarine  as 
a  commerce  destroyer  and  blockader.  Possession  of 
Bruges,  with  its  canals  to  Zeebrugge  and  Ostend,  gave 
them,  with  Antwerp,  an  admirable  operating  base, 
close  to  the  main  lines  of  English  commerce.  If  they 
could  also  seize  the  French  coast  opposite  Dover  they 
might  hope  practically  to  seal  Dover  Strait. 

A  slight  delay  in  organizing  the  new  contingents 
lost  Germany  her  best  chance  to  reach  Dunkirk  and 
Calais.  Early  in  October  the  Allied  left  wing  rested 
on  Bethune.  German  cavalry  occupied  the  valley  of 
the  Lys  River,  north  of  B6thune,  with  advance  guards 
beyond  Bailleul.  The  British  Expeditionary  Army 
left  the  Aisne  on  October  5th  and  began  to  detrain  a 
few  days  later  at  St.  Omer.  From  that  point  it  marched 
north-east  to  form  a  junction  with  the  Belgian  army, 
which  was  retreating  from  Antwerp,  covered  by  British 
cavalry  under  General  Rawlinson. 

The  German  cavalry  in  the  Lys  Valley  could  not 
hold  their  ground  and  retired  east  of  Ypres  to  Roulers, 
the  British  gaining  the  line  from  Armentieres  north 
through  Ypres  to  Dixmude.  Before  the  German  con- 
centration in  the  north  was  completed  all  the  gaps  in 
the  Allied  line  to  the  sea  had  closed. 

The  German  attempt  to  break  through  began  on 
October   17th   and   lasted   until   November    17th.     It 


150    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

was  made  by  probably  six  hundred  thousand  troops, 
most  of  them  new  divisions,  although  they  were  sup- 
ported by  Rupprecht's  Bavarian  army,  and  the  Prus- 
sian Guard  was  hurried  up  from  the  south  eventually 
to  take  part  in  the  five-day  assault  on  Ypres. 

German  tactics  had  not  yet  changed.  Heavy  mass 
formations  were  used  in  attack,  and  the  casualties  corre- 
sponded with  the  ardour  and  courage  of  the  troops, 
which  all  observers  admitted  to  be  high.  Germany 
was  at  that  time  in  a  hysterical  ferment  of  rage  against 
England.  It  was  the  day  of  Ernst  Lissauer's  Hymn 
of  Hate  with  its  refrain 

We  have  all  but  a  single  hate, 
We  have  all  but  a  single  foe : 
England. 

It  was  the  day  of  the  first  Zeppelin  attacks  on 
British  cities  and  of  the  first  naval  bombardments  of 
Britain's  open  coast  towns.  The  effects  of  this  obses- 
sion were  shown  in  the  brutal  proclamations  of  Crown 
Prince  Rupprecht  of  Bavaria  to  the  German  Sixth 
Army.  They  were  also  manifested,  perhaps,  in  the 
sustained  fury  of  the  German  attacks. 

The  first  blow  fell  on  the  Belgians  and  French  who 
held  the  lines  from  Dixmude  to  the  sea.  Here  Generals 
Foch  and  Grossetti  performed  wonders.  They  were 
greatly  outnumbered,  but  held  on  by  utilizing  all  the 


The  Battle  of  Flanders  151 

advantages  of  a  terrain  strikingly  adapted  to  defence. 
In  this  flat,  soggy  region  artillery  was  handicapped  and 
the  German  infantry  was  cut  to  pieces  advancing  in 
masses  across  the  open.  By  sheer  weight  the  Germans 
finally  took  Dixmude  and  passed  the  Yser  River.  But 
they  were  stopped  when  the  Belgians  dammed  the  river 
near  its  mouth,  where  British  warships  covered  their 
positions,  and  flooded  the  lowlands.  This  overflow 
barrier  proved  effective  for  the  rest  of  the  war. 

Further  south  the  Germans  tried,  early  in  November, 
to  crush  the  famous  Ypres  salient.  They  drove  the 
British  back  from  the  neighbourhood  of  Roulers  and 
took  the  heights  east  and  south-east  of  Ypres.  But 
they  were  never  able  to  reach  the  city  itself — a  mass 
of  ruins- — which  held  out  then  just  as  it  held  out  later, 
though  in  dire  straits,  against  the  German  attacks  of 
April,  1 91 5,  and  April,  191 8.  Apparently  indefensible, 
commanded  on  two  sides  by  the  Passchendaele  and 
Messines  ridges,  it  was  nevertheless  defended  by  the 
sheer  grit  of  that  army  which  in  the  early  days  of  the 
war  William  II  had  scornfully  characterized  as  "con- 
temptible." 

The  battle  of  Flanders  cost  the  Germans  vastly 
greater  losses  than  the  first  battle  of  the  Marne  did. 
It  was  the  death-blow  to  the  old  German  system  of 
battle  tactics.     It  proved  that  dense  masses  of  infantry 


i52    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

could  not  of  their  own  strength  break  through  trench 
lines  held  by  much  inferior  forces.  Modern  weapons 
had  too  greatly  augmented  the  power  of  the  defensive 
to  beat  down  frontal  infantry  attacks.  Henceforth — 
at  least  on  the  West  Front,  where  the  quality  of  the  op- 
posing troops  was  fairly  equal — frontal  attacks  would 
prove  futile  until  some  new  devices  had  been  found 
for  restoring  superiority  to  the  offensive.  The  new  prob- 
lems of  trench  deadlock  had  to  be  faced  and  solved. 
And  the  real  solution  was  not  to  come  until  three  years 
later — at  the  battle  of  Cambrai. 

Lieutenant-General  Baron  Freytag-Loringhoven  in- 
timates, in  his  Deductions  from  the  World  War,  that 
the  Germans  lost  the  battles  of  the  Yser  and  of  Ypres 
because  they  used  too  many  new  formations.  "These 
new  troops,"  he  holds,  "could  not  be  equal  to  cop- 
ing with  the  difficult  conditions  which  prevailed  at 
Ypres." 

He  says  further: 

In  their  case  the  period  of  training  was  not  really 
adequate  to  transform  them  into  thoroughly  efficient 
battle-troops.  The  experience  of  the  officers,  very 
few  of  whom  were  on  the  active  list  at  the  time,  with 
all  their  good  will,  was  not  really  adequate  and  the 
same  was  true  of  their  physical  fitness.  This  applies 
equally  to  a  large  proportion  of  the  men  in  the  ranks, 
that  is  to  say,  of  the  young  war  volunteers.     They 


The  Battle  of  Flanders  153 

had  excellent  qualities  and  were  filled  with  the 
purest  patriotic  enthusiasm,  but  this  could  not  com- 
pensate for  the  lack  of  soldierly  discipline  and  physi- 
cal hardening  which  can  be  acquired  only  in  the 
course  of  a  thorough  military  training. 

A  curious  apology!  Opposed  to  the  Germans  in 
Flanders  was  a  motley  force  of  very  uneven  quality 
— of  many  races,  tongues,  and  degrees  of  military  ex- 
perience. It  fought  day  in  and  day  out,  with  only  the 
scantiest  reserves.  The  Germans  had  ample  reserves. 
They  also  sent  to  Belgium  Crown  Prince  Rupprecht's 
first-line  Bavarian  army  and  the  Prussian  Guard. 
If  the  Channel  ports  were  worth  taking  sound  leader- 
ship would  have  forbidden  an  attempt  to  take  them 
with  second-class  troops,  while  better  troops  were 
holding  the  line  from  Arras  down  to  Belfort,  on  which 
the  fighting  had  died  down. 

Here  again,  as  at  the  Marne,  the  German  High  Com- 
mand undervalued  the  enemy.  Freytag-Loringhoven 
criticizes  Joffre  for  not  extending  his  line  north  more 
rapidly.  But  Joffre  had  relatively  small  reserves  on 
hand  in  October,  1914.  He  was  forced  to  do  the  best 
he  could  with  what  he  had.  The  German  High  Com- 
mand, on  the  contrary,  had  a  choice.  It  cannot  excuse 
itself  for  failure  on  the  ground  that  it  preferred  to 
employ  new  formations  instead  of  seasoned  ones. 


154    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

The  Flanders  campaign  ended,  as  the  Marne  cam- 
paign did,  in  a  big  German  reverse.  The  second  Ger- 
man bid  for  a  decisive  success  on  the  West  Front  failed. 
The  Allies,  rallying  in  the  nick  of  time,  saved  the  Chan- 
nel ports,  as  they  had  saved  Paris  two  months  before. 
It  was  demonstrated  for  a  second  time  that  Germany 
had  only  a  gambler's  chance  to  overrun  and  conquer 
France. 

But  again  the  Allied  victory  was  only  negative  in 
results.  It  was  another  victory  of  arrest.  It  left 
with  the  Germans  the  fruits  of  a  second  offensive  cam- 
paign. Practically  all  of  Belgium  was  lost  to  the 
Entente.  Germany  secured  the  strip  of  seacoast  which 
she  coveted  as  a  base  for  submarine  warfare  and  for 
air  raids  on  England.  She  also  obtained  a  free  hand 
for  her  experiment  of  segregating  the  Flemings  from 
the  Walloons,  claiming  kinship  in  race  and  language 
with  the  former  and  attempting  to  segregate  them  in 
a  pro-Teuton  Flemish  state.  The  iron  and  steel  in- 
dustries centering  about  Liege  were  taken  over  by  the 
German  Government.  Belgian  banking  resources  were 
attached.  Belgian  labour  was  impressed  and  deported 
beyond  the  Rhine  and  the  non-labouring  population 
was  left  dependent  for  food  on  the  charity  of  neutrals 
and  the  Allies. 

After   the   Flanders   campaign   Belgium's   existence 


The  Battle  of  Flanders  155 

as  an  independent  state  was  suspended.  The  German 
inroads  into  Northern  France  also  had  very  grave 
consequences.  Ninety  per  cent,  of  the  iron  ore  pro- 
duced in  France  came  from  the  Briey  and  Longwy 
basins,  which  were  both  overrun  by  Germany  before 
the  battle  of  the  Marne.  Seventy  per  cent,  of  the 
coal  mined  in  France  came  from  the  Valenciennes  basin, 
lost  to  the  Germans  in  the  Flanders  campaign.  The 
steel,  textile,  and  sugar  industries  of  France  were  con- 
centrated largely  in  the  invaded  regions.  The  Germans 
plundered  and  devastated  these  regions.  Northern 
France  suffered  damage  under  German  occupation  es- 
timated at  $13,000,000,000.  Belgium  suffered  to  the  ex- 
tent of  $2,000,000,000  in  devastation  and  $2,000,000,000 
more  in  spoliation  and  military  tribute. 

These  penalties  were  incidental  to  the  purely  military 
penalties.  The  Germans  secured  a  foothold  deep 
within  the  enemy's  territory  from  which  they  were  not 
dislodged  until  the  closing  days  of  the  war.  Even 
when  the  armistice  was  signed  more  than  three  fourths 
of  the  German  western  armies  were  on  foreign  soil. 
The  positions  which  the}'  had  seized  in  Northern 
France  were  admirably  suited  to  a  long  defensive  cam- 
paign. They  were  equally  suited  to  new  offensive 
operations  against  Paris  and  the  Channel  ports. 

If  the  Marne  and  Flanders  offensives  had  failed  to 


156    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

bring  anything  like  a  decision  over  the  Allies  they  had 
at  least  carried  the  war  far  beyond  the  German  frontier 
(except  in  Lorraine  and  Alsace),  put  staggering  bur- 
dens on  France  and  Belgium,  and  assured  Germany 
complete  strategic  freedom  by  safeguarding  her  western 
border. 

It  was  evident  by  the  end  of  November,  1914,  that 
neither  antagonist  was  able  to  exhaust  or  crush  the 
other  in  the  West.  Each  had  underestimated  the  other's 
strength.  Moltke  lost  a  great  strategical  opportunity 
at  the  Marne.  Joffre  lost  one  after  the  German  retreat 
to  the  Aisne.  Freytag-Loringhoven  makes  this  curious 
admission : 

This  war  has  furnished  instances  where  the  en- 
velopment of  a  whole  host  might  have  been  effected 
and  would  have  had  far-reaching  consequences. 
Such  an  opportunity  was  presented  to  our  opponents 
on  the  Western  Front  after  the  battle  of  the  Marne. 
By  making  use  of  their  convenient  and  efficient 
railway  network  and  their  numerous  columns  of 
motor  cars  they  might  have  hurled  at  the  proper 
moment  powerful  forces  against  the  right  flank  of 
the  German  army,  and  thereby  prevented  us  from 
establishing  our  positions  on  the  Aisne  and  to  the 
west  of  the  Belgian  frontier.  Since,  however,  they 
had  not  achieved  a  tactical  success  at  the  Marne  at 
all,  they  lacked  the  strength  and  capacity  for  such 
an  undertaking.  They  pressed  their  attack  only  in 
a   frontal   direction.     The    German   forces    at    once 


The  Battle  of  Flanders  157 

resumed  in  part  an  offensive  attitude  and  by  this 
means  arrested  the  progress  of  the  enemy  forces 
opposed  to  them.  They  strengthened  the  right 
wing  of  their  army  and  were  always  able  to  oppose 
adequate  forces  to  the  striking  movement  of  the 
French  pursuing  army  when  the  latter  at  length 
(but  too  late)  set  itself  in  motion. 

Neither  side  had  in  the  West  in  1914  the  leadership  or 
the  numbers  with  which  to  establish  a  real  superiority. 
The  Germans,  therefore,  wisely  decided  at  the  end  of 
19 14  to  turn  to  the  East — in  spite  of  the  fact  that  the 
results  of  the  Western  fighting  had  been,  on  the  whole, 
largely  in  their  favour.  They  had  a  freedom  of  choice 
and  they  sought  a  field  in  which  a  decision  promised 
to  be  quicker  and  easier.  The  Allies  had  little  choice 
and  slight  strategic  freedom.  The  French  were  tied 
down  to  home  defence.  The  British  lacked  the  con- 
fidence, and  to  some  extent  the  numbers,  to  turn  away 
resolutely  from  the  West.  The  Gallipoli  expedition 
of  1 91 5  represented  only  a  lame  and  hastily  improvised 
effort  to  do  so. 

The  advantages  of  Germany's  geographical  position 
now  came  into  full  play.  She  sealed  up  her  West  Front 
and  took  up  the  more  vital  and  promising  task  of 
destroying  Russia. 


CHAPTER  IX 


RUSSIA  S    EARLY    SUCCESSES 


Russia  was  the  chief  puzzle  of  the  first  year  of  the 
war.  Up  to  May  i,  191 5,  she  had  apparently  accom- 
plished more  than  any  other  of  the  belligerents.  She 
had  almost  held  her  own  against  Germany.  She  had 
won  a  striking  series  of  victories  over  Austria-Hungary. 
She  had  taken  more  than  three  hundred  thousand 
prisoners,  including  the  Przemysl  garrison  of  130,000 
men. 

Russia's  line  of  mobilization  ran  north  and  south, 
through  Brest-Litovsk,  near  the  eastern  boundary  of 
Poland.  That  line  was  her  true  military  frontier. 
Poland  jutted  out  from  it  in  an  almost  indefensible 
salient.  The  Russians  had  an  advanced  front  on  the 
Vistula,  from  Ivangorod  north  through  Warsaw  to 
Novogeorgievsk ;  thence  turning  north-east  through 
Ossowiec  and  Augustovo  to  Kovno,  on  the  Niemen. 
All  of  Poland  to  the  west  of  this  front  was  conceded  to 
the  Germans. 

This  advanced  line  was  endangered  by  the  fact  that 

158 


Russia's  Early  Successes  159 

Poland  was  inclosed  on  three  sides  by  German  and 
Austrian  territory.  Warsaw  could  be  taken  in  the 
rear  by  an  enemy  advance  out  of  Galicia  toward  Lublin. 
The  Austro-Hungarians  took  that  route  in  August, 
1 9 14,  getting  as  far  as  Krasnik.  Their  strategy  was 
good.  It  failed  only  because  the  Russians  countered 
with  an  offensive  in  Eastern  Galicia  which  broke 
through  the  Austro-Hungarian  front  about  Lemberg 
and  drove  Francis  Joseph's  armies  in  disorder  back 
across  the  San  River  and  the  Carpathians. 

In  the  first  nine  months  of  the  war  the  Russians 
pushed  their  lines  west  well  beyond  Warsaw,  in  Poland, 
and  almost  to  Cracow  in  Western  Galicia.  They  held 
more  enemy  territory  in  the  East  than  the  Germans 
had  overrun  in  the  West.  The  Germans  occupied 
about  8000  square  miles  of  France  and  1 1 ,000  square 
miles  of  Belgium.  But  Russia  had  not  only  taken 
firm  possession  of  most  of  Poland,  but  had  captured 
35,000  square  miles  of  Austrian  territory  in  Galicia 
and  Bukowina. 

Many  causes  contributed  to  Russia's  brilliant  show- 
ing. Her  mobilization  was  already  under  way  when 
the  war  began.  She  had  started  to  organize  her  south- 
western front  as  soon  as  it  was  evident  that  Austria- 
Hungary  was  trying  to  pick  a  quarrel  with  Serbia. 
Her  military  preparations  were  really  more  advanced 


160    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

than  Austria-Hungary's  were.  Her  armies  in  the 
opening  weeks  of  the  war  easily  outnumbered  those  of 
Austria-Hungary . 

Teuton  diplomatic  blunders  had  helped  Russia. 
Rumania  was  long  an  adjunct  to  the  Triple  Alliance. 
Her  sovereign  was  a  Hohenzollern.  Her  people  dis- 
liked and  feared  Russia,  which  had  treated  Rumania 
very  shabbily  after  the  war  with  Turkey  in  1877-78, 
depriving  her  of  Bessarabia.  The  Rumanians  looked 
to  Berlin  for  protection  against  Slav  ambitions.  But 
policy  at  Vienna  was  largely  controlled  by  Hungary, 
and  Hungary  was  notorious  as  an  oppressor  of  her 
subject  peoples,  among  whom  were  the  Rumanians 
of  Transylvania.  The  Rumanian  Government  could 
not  remain  indifferent  to  the  wrongs  of  Latin  kinsmen 
across  the  Hungarian  border.  So  an  intense  friction 
developed  between  Vienna  and  Bucharest. 

In  the  second  Balkan  War  Austria-Hungary  sided 
with  Bulgaria  and  sought  to  annul  the  terms  of  peace 
imposed  on  Bulgaria  by  Rumania,  Serbia,  Greece,  and 
Montenegro.  That  interference  detached  Rumania 
from  the  Triple  Alliance.  Her  relations  with  Russia 
became  more  friendly,  and  it  was  plain  from  the  begin- 
ning of  the  war  that  she  would  either  remain  neutral 
or  side  with  the  Allies. 

Russia  was  therefore  relieved  from  the  necessity  of 


Russia's  Early  Successes  161 

guarding  the  Bessarabian  frontier,  just  as  France  had 
been  relieved  by  Italy's  alienation  from  the  Triple 
Alliance  of  the  necessity  of  guarding  Nice  and  Savoy. 
Austria-Hungary,  on  the  contrary,  not  only  had  to 
fight  Serbia  on  the  south,  but  also  to  keep  watch  on 
Rumania  and  Italy,  her  former  allies.  All  Russia's 
forces  in  the  south  could  be  concentrated  for  an  invasion 
of  Bukowina  and  Galicia. 

The  Russian  army  had  learned  some  hard  lessons 
in  the  Japanese  War.  General  Kuropatkin,  though  a 
non-aggressive  commander-in-chief,  was  an  intelligent 
soldier.  After  the  Japanese  War  he  prepared  reports 
for  the  government  in  which  he  frankly  exposed  the 
deficiencies  of  the  Russian  military  system.  Steps 
were  taken  to  remedy  some  of  these.  The  Japanese 
War  had  been  intensely  unpopular.  But  even  before 
the  Balkan  wars  there  was  a  striking  rebirth  in  Russia 
of  nationalistic  and  Pan-Slavic  feeling,  under  the  influ- 
ence of  which  the  military  establishment  was  expanded 
and  materially  improved.  New  and  friendly  relations 
with  Great  Britain  had  reawakened  Russian- ambitions 
in  the  Balkans  and  aroused  fresh  hopes  of  a  triumphant 
entry  into  Constantinople. 

Russia  saw  trouble  with  Austria-Hungary  and  Ger- 
many coming  and  was  at  least  superficially  prepared 
for  it.     When  the  war  clouds  broke  the  Czar  had  a 


1 62    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

formidable  army  ready  for  service  on  his  western  fron- 
tier. He  had  a  partially  competent  officers'  corps  and 
a  fairly  good  General  Staff.  His  forces  were  moder- 
ately well  supplied  with  artillery  and  with  munitions, 
which  were  used  lavishly  while  they  lasted.  Nothing, 
of  course,  could  overcome  the  inherent  weakness  of  a 
national  army  recruited  from  an  inert  and  backward 
population  like  Russia's.  But  this  handicap,  as  well 
as  the  scantiness  of  material  out  of  which  good  com- 
missioned and  non-commissioned  officers  could  be 
created,  did  not  make  its  effect  felt  disastrously  until 
the  spring  of  191 5. 

In  the  war  plans  originally  drawn  by  the  French  and 
Russian  general  staffs  Russia  was  to  put  in  the  field  at 
once  about  1,600,000  men.  Half  of  these  were  to  be 
used  in  containing  the  900,000  Austro-Hungarians 
expected  to  mobilize  on  the  Eastern  Front.  The  other 
half  were  to  be  used  in  attacking  Germany — the 
"principal  enemy." 

Russia  exceeded  her  mobilization  programme.  She 
probably  had  1,800,000  men  in  the  field  in  August, 
1914.  But  she  used  less  than  half  of  these  against 
Germany.  Two  Russian  armies  entered  East  Prussia 
about  the  middle  of  August.  The  first,  under  Rennen- 
kampf,  crossed  the  Niemen  and  moved  west  toward 
Konigsberg.     It   won   the   battle   of   Gumbinnen   and 


Russia's  Early  Successes  163 

pressed  on  beyond  Insterburg.  The  second  army, 
under  Samsonoff,  advanced  north-west  out  of  Poland, 
threatening  the  line  of  the  Vistula  north  of  Thorn. 
This  army  was  badly  handled,  and  in  the  last  week  in 
August  walked  into  a  trap  at  Tannenberg,  where  it 
was  partially  enveloped  and  routed  by  Hindenburg, 
who  had  been  put  in  command  of  the  German  forces 
in  the  East.  The  Russian  losses  were  probably  above 
125,000. 

This  striking  victory  caught  the  German  imagination 
and  started  Hindenburg's  colossal  vogue  as  the  German 
War  God.  No  very  clear  accounts  were  furnished  of 
the  battle  of  Tannenberg.  The  German  public  accepted 
a  legendary  version  of  it,  just  as  it  accepted  the  whole- 
sale fabrications  of  Russian  outrages  in  East  Prussia. 
The  series  of  booklets  on  the  campaigns  and  battles  of 
the  war,  issued  for  popular  consumption  by  the  German 
General  Staff,  is  as  silent  about  Tannenberg  as  it  is 
about  the  battle  of  the  Marne. 

Dr.  Miihlon  recounts  in  his  diary  one  of  the  blood- 
curdling stories  circulated  in  Germany  to  add  to  Hin- 
denburg's glory.  He  writes  under  the  date  of  October 
5.  1914: 

What  did  Hindenburg's  troops  do  when  they 
triumphed  over  the  Russians?  The  story  goes  from 
mouth  to  mouth.     It  was  not  enough  that  the  enemy 


1 64    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

was  driven  into  the  swamps;  tens  of  thousands  of 
them  who  wished  to  surrender  and  sought  to  clam- 
ber out  of  the  morass  were  pushed  back  at  the  bay- 
onet's point,  until  they  were  suffocated  and  drowned. 
This  was  done  under  orders.  Quarter  was  not  to 
be  given.  One  could  not  make  use  at  home  of  so 
many  prisoners.  For  days  and  nights  the  cries  of 
the  drowning  were  heard  above  the  thunder  of  the 
cannon;  and  many  a  soldier  who  was  obliged  to 
listen  to  this  clamour  of  desperation  lost  his  reason. 
Ninety  thousand  prisoners  were  taken  in  that  battle ; 
but  it  is  said  that  still  more  were  murdered  as  they 
lay  helpless  and  pleading  for  aid. 

Miihlon  doesn't  vouch  for  the  truth  of  this  story. 
Hindenburg  was  credited  a  year  or  more  later  with 
admitting  that  it  was  a  mere  fiction. 

General  Basil  Gourko,  who  commanded  Rennen- 
kampf's  cavalry,  says  in  his  book  War  and  Revolution 
in  Russia,  published  in  English  in  19 19,  that  the  two 
corps  of  Samsonoff's  army  which  were  lost  were  sur- 
rounded in  Tannenberg  forest.  Samsonoff  himself,  try- 
ing to  escape  on  foot  in  the  night,  became  separated 
from  his  staff  and  died  in  the  woods,  Gourko  thinks 
from  heart  failure.  The  story  which  Miihlon  repeats  is 
evidently  a  grotesque  counterpart  of  the  legend  which 
represents  the  Prussian  Guard  as  engulfed  in  the  St. 
Gond  marshes  at  the  battle  of  the  Marne. 

Tannenberg  was  a  smashing  reverse  for  the  Russians. 


Russia's  Early  Successes  165 

It  ended  the  Entente  dream  of  a  Russian  offensive 
against  Germany — of  a  Cossack  march  to  Berlin  across 
the  Vistula  and  the  Oder.  It  was  made  evident  in  the 
very  first  month  of  the  war  that  Russia  no  longer 
ranked  with  Germany  as  a  military  power.  She  could 
not  fight  the  Germans  on  equal  terms.  Her  superiority 
in  numbers  was  more  than  offset  by  her  inferiority  in 
leadership,  organization,  and  military  efficiency. 

Russia  could  never  hope  to  crush  Germany.  But 
a  sound  instinct  led  her  to  believe  that  she  could  come 
near  to  crushing  Austria-Hungary.  Even  before  Tan- 
nenberg  she  had  decided  to  depart  from  the  strategic 
plan  agreed  on  with  the  French  General  Staff.  She 
resolved  to  make  her  chief  effort  against  the  Austro- 
Hungarian  armies,  instead  of  merely  containing  them. 
The  "secondary  enemy"  was  converted  into  the  "prin- 
cipal enemy."  Conditions  on  the  Austrian  front  had 
changed  since  1892  and  the  change  was  all  in  Russia's 
favour.  Austria-Hungary  was  unable  in  August,  1914, 
to  put  900,000  men  on  the  Eastern  battle  line.  She 
was  too  much  tied  up  with  the  Serbian  campaign  to  do 
so.  Her  forces  in  Galicia  and  Bukowina  numbered 
hardly  700,000.  Against  them  the  Russians  had 
concentrated  probably  1,100,000. 

Moreover,  the  Austrian  High  Command  played  into 
Russia's   hand.     It   had    undertaken    an    offensive    in 


1 66    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Poland  far  too  ambitious  for  its  resources.  General 
Dankl's  army  moved  north  from  the  San  River  into 
the  Lublin  gap,  intending  to  take  the  Warsaw-Ivan- 
gorod  line  in  the  rear.  In  order  to  keep  in  touch  with 
Dankl's  forces  Auffenberg  was  obliged  to  extend  dan- 
gerously the  left  wing  of  the  army  covering  Lemberg. 

Russia  had  three  armies  to  Austria-Hungary's  two. 
One,  under  Ivanoff,  moved  west  from  Brest-Litovsk  to 
defend  Lublin.  The  other  two,  under  Russky  and 
Brusiloff,  respectively,  converged  on  Lemberg,  from 
the  north-east,  east,  and  south-east.  AufTenberg's 
line  was  first  broken  and  turned  at  its  southern  end, 
about  Halicz,  on  the  Dniester  River.  That  reverse 
forced  a  general  withdrawal  and  the  evacuation  of 
Lemberg. 

AufTenberg  next  made  a  stand  on  the  line  from  Gro- 
dek,  north  to  Rawa-Russka,  where  his  front  adjoined 
Dankl's.  Russky  then  broke  and  turned  AufTenberg's 
position  at  its  northern  end  and  created  a  gap  between 
his  army  and  Dankl's.  Ivanoff  threw  himself  on  Dankl. 
The  Austrians  were  routed  at  every  point,  retreating 
south  across  the  Carpathians  and  west  toward  Cracow. 
About  200,000  Austrian  prisoners  were  taken.  The 
total  Austrian  casualties  were  probably  over  300,000. 

These  brilliant  victories  obscured  the  disaster  at 
Tannenberg.     They    restored    Russia's    prestige,    and, 


Russia's  Early  Successes  167 

since  they  coincided  with  Joffre's  success  at  the  Marne, 
they  raised  unwarranted  hopes  of  a  real  Franco-Russian 
military  concert  directed  against  the  "principal  enemy 
power."  These  hopes  were  extinguished  in  the  West 
when  the  Germans  rallied  at  the  Aisne,  conquered 
practically  all  of  Belgium,  and  extended  their  hold  on 
Northern  France.  They  were  extinguished  in  the 
East  when  the  Russian  campaign  in  Western  Poland 
failed  late  in  November  in  the  very  confused  operations 
about  Lodz. 

For  a  time,  however,  after  the  Lemberg  victories, 
while  the  Austro-Hungarians  were  recuperating  and 
the  Germans  were  organizing  new  formations  behind 
the  Vistula  fortresses,  the  Russian  offensive  showed  con- 
siderable vitality.  The  armies  in  Galicia  crossed  the 
San,  invested  Przemysl,  pushed  west  toward  Cracow 
and  south-west  to  the  passes  of  the  Carpathians.  The 
Austrians  could  not  stop  them  unaided.  But  Germany 
was  able  to  suspend  Russian  progress  in  the  south  by 
sending  Hindenburg  east  from  Silesia  in  a  dash  for 
Warsaw,  while  a  supporting  Austrian  army  marched 
from  the  north  of  Cracow  for  Ivangorod. 

This  was  Hindenburg's  first  Polish  counter-offensive. 
It  lasted  only  three  weeks.  The  Germans  got  as  far 
as  the  outskirts  of  Warsaw  and  dropped  a  few  shells 
in  the  city.     But  the  Russians  brought  up  troops  from 


1 68    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Galicia,  crossed  the  Vistula,  and  attacked  Hindenburg's 
flanks.  He  retreated  with  great  rapidity.  His  man- 
oeuvre, however,  had  dislocated  the  Russian  front  in 
Galicia,  the  armies  there  retiring  from  the  Carpathians 
and  to  the  east  of  the  San.  The  siege  of  Przemysl  was 
momentarily  raised  by  the  Austrians. 

When  the  danger  to  Warsaw  had  passed  the  Russian 
advance  in  the  south  was  resumed.  It  carried  the 
invaders  beyond  the  Dunajec  and  to  within  about 
eio-ht  miles  of  Cracow.  At  the  same  time  the  Russian 
armies  west  of  the  Vistula  in  Poland  approached  the 
Prussian  frontier. 

This  was  Russian  high  tide  on  the  Polish-Galician 
front.  Some  Russian  cavalry  even  crossed  into  Posen. 
But  Hindenburg  had  now  received  heavy  reinforce- 
ments. He  used  them  in  a  second  campaign  for  War- 
saw, attacking  the  Russians  from  the  direction  of  Thorn. 

Hindenburg  turned  the  northern  flank  of  the  armies 
opposing  him  in  Western  Poland.  Then  a  part  of  his 
own  army  was  enveloped  by  Russian  forces  coming 
south  across  the  Vistula.  Here  Rennenkampf  failed  to 
take  advantage  of  a  great  opportunity.  After  desper- 
ate fighting  the  tangled  situation  was  straightened  out 
by  a  Russian  retirement  from  Lodz  toward  Warsaw. 
Later  in  December  Hindenburg  attacked  the  Russians 
on  their  new  front  and  forced  them  back  to  the  Bzura- 


Russia's  Early  Successes  169 

Rawka  line,  close  to  the  Vistula.  There  they  held  on 
successfully  until  the  following  summer. 

The  battles  in  Poland  in  October,  November,  and 
December  proved  that,  although  the  Russians  were 
incapable  of  a  sustained  offensive  against  the  Germans, 
they  could  at  least  meet  and  repel  German  attacks. 
Hindenburg  had  used  against  them  the  old  tactics  of 
massed  infantry  assault — the  same  that  had  failed  so 
disastrously  on  the  West  Front  in  the  battles  of  the 
Yser  and  of  Ypres.  He  had  now  nearly  equal  numbers 
and  the  benefit  of  an  admirable  network  of  strategic 
railroads  in  his  rear.  But  he  had  not  acquired  that 
vast  superiority  in  artillery  which  was  needed  to  break 
through  intrenched  fronts.  As  in  the  Japanese  War, 
the  Russian  armies  were  sluggish  and  uncertain  on  the 
offensive,  but  tenacious  on  the  defensive.  The  trench 
warfare  deadlock,  which  began  on  the  East  Front  also 
in  the  fall  of  19 14,  did  much  to  neutralize  temporarily 
the  defects  in  Russia's  military  organization. 

After  January,  191 5,  the  German  High  Command 
turned  to  the  East  for  the  decision  which  it  had  missed 
in  the  West.  Many  new  divisions  were  assigned  to 
Hindenburg  and  vast  stores  of  supplies  were  accumu- 
lated in  Posen,  Silesia,  and  West  Prussia.  The  first 
sign  of  this  change  in  German  policy  came  in  the  con- 
tinuance of  operations  in  the  East  all  through  the  win- 


170    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

ter  of  1 914-15,  although  in  the  West  the  fighting  died 
down  to  almost  nothing.  It  was  probably  Germany's 
primary  aim  to  wear  out  Russia's  fragile  military 
machine — to  deplete  her  artillery  and  munitions  re- 
serves, leaving  her  undersupplied  in  the  spring  and 
thus  nullifying  Russian  superiority  in  crude  man  power. 

Berlin  had  now  assumed  complete  control  of  the 
Austro-Hungarian  armies.  In  January  German  divi- 
sions were  sent  into  Hungary  to  quiet  Magyar  unrest 
and  to  threaten  Serbia  and  Rumania.  A  large  part 
of  Bukowina  was  recaptured  and  Austro-Hungarian 
forces  were  set  in  motion  to  relieve  Przemysl. 

In  the  north  Hindenburg  continued  into  February 
his  attacks  on  the  lines  defending  Warsaw.  Then  he 
moved  around  into  East  Prussia  to  meet  a  second  Rus- 
sian invasion.  This  ended,  as  the  first  one  did,  in  a 
severe  Russian  defeat.  In  the  Battle  of  the  Mazurian 
Lakes,  fought  in  the  midst  of  midwinter  storms,  Hin- 
denburg repeated  his  Tannenberg  strategy  of  envelop- 
ment and  captured  forty  thousand  prisoners.  For 
the  third  time  he  demonstrated  the  hopelessness  of 
any  Russian  offensive  against  Germany.  But,  though 
Hindenburg  could  smash  the  Russians  in  open  fighting, 
he  could  not  break  through  their  defence  of  Warsaw. 
He  made  one  more  effort  in  February  and  March,  this 
time  from  the  north — and  once  more  failed. 


Russia's  Early  Successes  171 

Przemysl,  the  great  Austrian  stronghold  near  the 
San,  surrendered  on  March  22,  1915.  The  Russians 
starved  it  out.  They  lacked  the  big  howitzers  which 
Germany  had  used  to  reduce  Liege,  Namur,  Maubeuge, 
and  Antwerp.  They  lacked  proper  siege  trains.  So 
they  sat  down  and  waited  patiently  for  the  fortress  to 
fall,  meanwhile  frustrating  Austro-Hungarian  attempts 
to  relieve  it. 

It  was  a  sensational  capitulation— the  most  sensa- 
tional of  the  sort  during  the  war.  But  the  Allied  pub- 
lics greatly  misjudged  its  meaning.  The  capture  of 
Przemysl  was  not  due  to  Russian  skill  and  vigour,  but 
to  Austrian  incompetency.  Przemysl  should  never 
have  been  held.  There  might  have  been  some  excuse 
for  throwing  an  army  into  it  during  the  hurried  retreat 
from  Lemberg  early  in  September,  on  the  theory  that 
the  necessity  of  investing  the  fortress  would  check  the 
Russian  pursuit. 

When  Joffre  retreated  from  the  Belgian  border  in 
August,  1 91 4,  he  left  a  garrison  of  forty  thousand  men 
in  Maubeuge.  They  were  able  to  hold  out  less  than 
two  weeks.  They  did  impede  the  German  pursuit 
a  little  and  left  Moltke  several  divisions  short  at  the 
Marne.  But  history  will  probably  say  that  the  results 
did  not  justify  Joffre  in  sacrificing  forty  thousand 
French  troops  at  Maubeuge. 


172    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

History  can  have  no  hesitation  whatever  about 
Przemysl.  Its  garrison  never  played  any  considerable 
role  in  checking  the  Russian  irruption  into  Central 
Galicia.  The  troops  interned  within  its  fortified  zone 
served  no  important  strategical  or  tactical  purpose. 
And  after  the  Austrians  were  lucky  enough  to  interrupt 
the  first  investment  in  October,  1914,  it  should  have 
been  furthest  from  their  thoughts  to  run  the  risks 
of  a  second  investment.  Fortresses  everywhere  had 
proved  to  be  nothing  but  man  traps.  But  General 
Conrad  Hotzendorff,  the  Austrian  chief  of  staff,  was 
too  thorough  an  Austrian  to  profit  by  experience.  He 
didn't  dismantle  and  abandon  Przemysl  when  he  had 
the  chance  to  do  so.  Instead,  he  left  Kusmanek's 
army  cooped  up  in  the  scantily  provisioned  stronghold 
when  he  retreated  a  second  time  across  the  Carpathians. 

The  long-drawn-out  siege  of  Przemysl  was,  in  fact, 
a  striking  symptom  of  Russia's  failing  strength.  Liege, 
Namur,  Maubeuge,  and  Antwerp  all  fell  within  two 
weeks  after  investment.  Przemysl  held  out  for  nearly 
five  months.  The  Russians  lacked  the  means  to  reduce 
it.  But  this  salient  fact  was  overlooked  in  the  Allied 
rejoicings  which  followed  its  surrender.  The  outside 
world,  ignorant  of  the  preparations  which  Germany 
was  making  for  a  spectacular  Eastern  campaign,  looked 
now  for  a  new  series  of  Russian  successes  which  would 


Russia's  Early  Successes  173 

carry  the  Czar's  armies  across  the  Carpathians  into  the 
Hungarian  plains. 

The  Grand  Duke  Nicholas  himself  seemed  to  think 
that  he  could  plough  his  way  through  the  mountain 
passes  and  threaten  Budapest  and  Vienna.  He  had 
already  begun  the  Battle  of  the  Carpathians.  After 
the  surrender  of  Przemysl  he  redoubled  his  efforts. 
He  concentrated  his  attack  on  the  two  westernmost 
passes,  Lupkow  and  Dukla.  The  last  named  was  the 
lowest  and  most  open  of  all  the  Carpathian  passages. 
Here  the  Russians  actually  got  through  the  mountains 
and  occupied  positions  on  the  south  side  of  the  range. 

But  by  the  end  of  March  Austrian  demoralization 
was  over.  The  Germans  had  reorganized  and  stiffened 
the  Austro-Hungarian  armies.  The  completion  of 
mobilization  had  filled  up  the  ranks.  While  holding 
fast  at  Dukla  and  Lupkow,  the  forces  of  the  Central 
Powers  took  the  offensive  along  the  rest  of  the  Carpa- 
thian line  and  gradually  got  a  footing  on  the  north- 
ern slopes.  The  Russian  offensive  slowed  down  and 
stopped.  A  couple  of  weeks  of  inaction  intervened. 
Then  Hindenburg  and  Mackensen  launched  the  tre- 
mendous assault  on  the  Dunajec,  east  of  Cracow,  which 
started  the  Russian  retreat  to  the  Dvina  River  and  the 
Pinsk  marshes. 

At  the  end  of  April  Russia  still  had  more  men  on  the 


174    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Polish- Galician  front  than  the  Teutonic  allies  had. 
She  had  a  resourceful  commander  in  chief  in  the  Grand 
Duke  Nicholas.  She  had  competent  army  commanders 
in  Alexieff ,  IvanofT,  Brusiloff,  and  Russky.  But  in  the 
continuous  fighting  since  August  she  had  suffered  al- 
most irreparable  losses  in  regimental  officers  and  first 
line  troops.  The  new  divisions,  recruited  rapidly  from 
the  heterogeneous  races  and  peoples  of  the  empire, 
were  of  uneven  quality  and  unequal  to  the  intensified 
demands  of  modern  warfare. 

Kuropatkin,  after  the  Japanese  War,  expressed  grave 
doubts  of  the  ability  of  a  Russian  national  army  to  hold 
its  own  against  the  armies  of  Germany  and  Austria- 
Hungary.  In  a  report  to  the  Czar  on  the  Manchurian 
campaign  he  wrote : 

Undoubtedly  universal  military  service  has,  from 
a  moral  standpoint,  improved  the  mass  of  our  troops, 
but  in  view  of  the  low  standard  of  civilization  of 
the  individual  men  it  is  difficult  to  infuse  them  with 
the  notion  of  discipline.  Belief  in  God,  devotion 
to  the  Czar,  love  for  the  Fatherland,  still  contribute 
to  keep  the  soldiers  firm  in  the  ranks  and  to  make 
them  brave  and  obedient  fighters,  but  these  feelings 
have  in  recent  times  been  severely  shaken  and  forcibly 
wrested  from  the  heart  of  the  Russians. 

The  Russian  armies  at  the  beginning  of  the  war 
did     much     to    discredit     Kuropatkin 's     forebodings. 


Russia's  Early  Successes  175 

But    as   time    passed    inherent    defects    became    more 
obvious. 

Lieutenant-General  Baron  Freytag-Loringhoven  says 
in  his  book,  A  Nation  Trained  in  Arms  or  a  Militia?: 

In  the  ten  years'  interval  between  the  Peace  of 
Portsmouth  and  the  outbreak  of  the  world  war  much 
had  been  done  to  promote  the  war  preparedness  of 
the  Russian  army.  But,  though  individual  improve- 
ments were  effected,  it  was  impossible  to  infuse  a 
new  spirit  into  a  national  army  of  gigantic  size  within 
the  space  of  ten  years,  more  especially  in  view  of  the 
low  standard  of  culture  and  the  apathetic  tempera- 
ment of  the  Russian  people.  Owing  to  its  insensibil- 
ity to  losses  and  defeats,  as  well  as  to  the  moral  effects 
of  retreat,  the  Russian  army  maintained  its  cohesion 
even  in  the  most  difficult  situations.  Nevertheless, 
the  unwieldy  character  of  the  Russian  masses  showed 
itself  just  as  it  had  done  in  previous  wars.  In  spite 
of  the  popular  notion  of  the  inexhaustible  supply  of 
the  Russian  reserves,  the  number  of  thoroughly 
trained  men  who  could  be  sent  to  the  front  grew 
less  and  less  as  time  went  on,  so  that  the  efficiency 
of  the  army  steadily  declined. 

Again  in  his  Deductions  from  the  World  War  the  same 
author  says : 

The  Russian  army  had  learned  much  from  the 
Manchurian  campaign,  both  as  regards  organization 
and   also   as  regards  strategy  and  tactics.     It   had 


176    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

been  systematically  organized  and  prepared  for  the 
war  against  Germany  and  Austria-Hungary.  Never- 
theless, the  defects  in  the  political  organism  of  the 
empire  and  in  the  national  character  could  not  be 
remedied  in  a  decade.  .  .  .  The  world  war,  no  less 
than  the  March  revolution  of  the  present  year  [191 7] 
though  in  a  different  sense,  has  revealed  that  Russia 
was  not  really  ripe  for  universal  military  service. 
Had  it  been  otherwise  we  and  our  Allies  might  have 
been  unable  to  defend  ourselves  against  envelopment 
of  overwhelmingly  superior  numbers. 

Worst  of  all,  the  deteriorating  Russian  army  of  April, 
191 5,  lacked  artillery  and  munitions.  Russia  had  spent 
lavishly  what  she  had  in  nine  months  of  continuous 
fighting.  At  the  beginning  of  the  year,  an  urgent  ap- 
peal had  been  made  to  France  and  Great  Britain  for 
assistance.  The  greatest  need  of  the  Allies  was  a 
connected  Eastern  and  Western  Front — a  short-cut 
through  the  Dardanelles  by  which  munitions,  big 
guns,  and  a  stiffening  of  Western  troops  could  flow 
uninterruptedly  into  Russia. 

France  was  too  much  tied  up  on  her  own  soil  to  do 
anything.  Great  Britain,  however,  heeded  Russia's 
appeal  to  the  extent  of  undertaking  to  force  the  Dar- 
danelles. Had  the  straits  been  opened  in  March,  191 5, 
Russia  could  probably  have  been  sustained  in  Galicia 
and  Poland  and  the  great  retreat  of  the  following 
summer  prevented. 


Russia's  Early  Successes  177 

But  the  naval  attack  on  the  Dardanelles  and  the 
Gallipoli  military  expedition  both  failed.  Russia  was 
left  in  an  exposed,  over-extended  position,  while  her 
power  was  steadily  weakening.  She  had  gallantly 
borne  more  than  her  share  of  the  Allied  burden.  She 
had  had  great  and  surprising  successes  in  the  field. 
But  she  had  shot  her  bolt.  There  was  a  touch  of 
illusion  in  her  victories.  Cut  off  from  the  West,  she 
could  not  maintain  an  unequal  struggle  with  Germany. 
After  Gallipoli  the  chance  to  develop  her  vast  man 
power  and  use  it  efficiently  was  definitively  lost  to 
the  Allies. 


CHAPTER  X 

THE   TRAGEDY   OF   GALLIPOLT 

For  the  Allies  the  Dardanelles  campaign  was  the 
most  poignant  tragedy  of  the  war.  It  was  the  defeat 
which  counted  most  heavily  against  them.  Failure 
to  force  the  straits  in  the  winter  and  spring  of  191 5 
blasted  the  one  real  hope  the  Entente  had  of  establishing 
a  continuous  front. 

The  capture  of  Constantinople  would  have  given 
the  Western  Powers  easy  access  to  Odessa  and  Kiev, 
the  bases  of  the  Russian  armies  operating  in  Bukowina 
and  Galicia.  It  would  have  prevented  Bulgaria's 
entry  into  the  war  as  an  ally  of  Germany  and  Austria- 
Hungary.  Turkey,  being  completely  isolated,  would 
have  been  compelled  to  sue  for  peace.  Serbia  would 
have  been  saved.  Rumania  could  have  joined  the 
Entente  without  risk  to  herself.  The  war  could  have 
been  carried  to  the  Danube  and  the  border  of  Transyl- 
vania and  an  iron  circle  could  have  been  drawn  about 
Germany  and  Austria-Hungary  from  the  North  Sea 

to  Switzerland,  through  the  Italian  Alps,  across  the 

178 


The  Tragedy  of  Gallipoli  179 

Adriatic,  and  up  through  Hungary,  Galicia,  and  Poland 
to  the  Baltic. 

Excluding  Foch's  final  campaign,  the  Dardanelles 
expedition  was  therefore  the  most  vital  offensive  opera- 
tion undertaken  by  the  Allies.  If  it  had  succeeded, 
it  would  have  changed  the  whole  course  of  the  war. 
By  winning  Constantinople  early  in  19 15,  the  Entente 
combination  would  probably  have  been  able  to  defeat 
the  two-power  Teuton  combination  without  help  from 
the  United  States. 

Because  the  sea  and  land  operations  at  Gallipoli 
were  dismal  fiascos  many  Allied  writers  have  vastly 
underrated  their  importance.  The  whole  enterprise 
has  been  cavalierly  brushed  aside  as  an  egregious 
strategical  blunder.  Such  a  view  is  unwarranted. 
The  strategy  of  the  Dardanelles  campaign  was 
eminently  sound.  The  British  War  Council  was  on 
the  right  track.  It  was  experimenting  with  a  big  and 
bold  idea.  The  fault  was  not  in  the  plan,  but  in  the 
execution. 

If  there  had  been  a  Farragut  in  command  of  the 
Allied  fleet  in  the  Dardanelles,  the  passage  to  Constan- 
tinople would  have  been  forced.  But  no  Farragut 
was  in  sight.  Overcaution  replaced  that  calm,  col- 
lected daring  which  inspired  the  running  of  the  forts 
of  the  Lower  Mississippi  and  of  Mobile  Bay. 


180    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

The  Turkish  defences  in  the  Dardanelles  were  no 
more  impassable  than  were  Forts  St.  Philip  and  Jack- 
son or  Forts  Morgan  and  Gaines.  Yet  the  British 
Admiralty  and  the  British  commander-in-chief  on  the 
spot  didn't  balance  with  sufficient  imagination  the 
penalties  of  failure  against  the  far-reaching  military 
consequences  of  success.  It  was  one  of  those  moments 
in  history  which  wait  for  the  instinct  of  genius  to 
manifest  itself  and  which  so  often  wait  in  vain! 

Conditions  in  the  winter  of  19 14-15  were,  in  fact, 
highly  favourable  to  an  Allied  attempt  to  reach  Con- 
stantinople. Turkey  had  been  forced  into  the  war 
prematurely  by  Baron  Wangenheim,  the  German 
Ambassador,  who  wanted  to  make  sure  that  the  Dar- 
danelles would  be  barred  to  ingoing  French  and 
British  and  outgoing  Russian  shipping.  Hostilities 
began  late  in  October,  following  a  surprise  naval  raid, 
under  German  management,  on  the  Russian  Black 
Sea  ports.  A  week  before  the  raid  was  made  Wangen- 
heim had  induced  the  Turkish  Government  to  close 
navigation  through  the  straits. 

Turkey  and  Bulgaria  were  expected  to  take  joint 
action.  But  Ferdinand  was  not  ready  to  show  his 
hand  until  the  autumn  of  191 5.  So  Turkey  remained 
cut  off  for  months  from  direct  and  easy  communication 
with  Austria-Hungary.     The  main  railroad  line  south 


The  Tragedy  of  Gallipoli 


181 


ran  through  Serbia  from  Belgrade  to  Nish;  and  all 
Serbia  was  then  in  the  hands  of  the  Serbians.  Ru- 
mania had  declared  a  strict  neutrality  and  put  a  ban 
on  the  passage  of  war  material  across  her  territory. 
German  soldiers  came  freely  to  Constantinople  in  mufti. 
But  the  shipment  of  munitions  was  limited  and  difficult. 
And  without  a  fair  supply  of  shells  for  the  Dardanelles 
forts  the  straits  could  not  be  held  against  a  vigorous 
naval  attack. 

On  January  2,  191 5,  the  Russian  Government  strongly 
urged  Great  Britain  and  France  to  make  a  campaign 
against  Constantinople.  Whether  or  not  the  Turks 
heard  of  this  message  through  German  spies,  Constan- 
tinople was  greatly  perturbed  all  through  January. 
Ambassador  Morgenthau's  Story  gives  a  vivid  picture 
of  conditions  in  the  Turkish  capital  in  that  panicky 
period.  According  to  his  testimony  the  belief  was 
general  that  the  Allied  fleet  would  attack  and  would 
get  through.  Wangenheim  shared  both  these  appre- 
hensions. So,  to  some  extent,  did  Goltz,  the  Ger- 
man supervisor  of  the  Turkish  military  establishment. 
On  this  point  the  American  envoy  writes: 

I  find  in  my  diary  Goltz's  precise  opinion,  as 
reported  to  me  by  Wangenheim,  and  I  quote  it  ex- 
actly as  it  was  written  at  that  time:  "Although  he 
thought  it  was  almost  impossible  to  force  the  Dar- 


1 82    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

danelles,  still,  if  England  thought  it  an  important 
move,  of  the  general  war,  they  could,  by  sacrificing 
ten  ships,  force  the  entrance,  and  do  it  very  fast, 
and  be  up  in  the  Marmora  within  ten  hours  from 
the  time  they  forced  it." 


The  Turkish  Government  made  feverish  preparations 
to  move  to  Eski-Shehr  in  Asia  Minor.  Wangenheim 
and  Pallavicini,  the  Austro-Hungarian  Ambassador, 
both  urged  the  Turkish  Cabinet  to  go  to  Adrianople 
instead.  But  Talaat  Pasha  considered  Eski-Shehr 
safer.  There  was  only  one  Turkish  or  Teuton  official 
who  maintained  that  Constantinople  wasn't  in  any 
danger.  That  was  the  swashbuckling  Enver  Pasha. 
But  he  was  under  a  cloud,  having  just  returned  from 
his  disastrous  Caucasus  campaign  against  the  Russians. 
He  found  no  listeners.  The  panic  in  Constantinople 
continued,  in  fact,  all  through  February.  After  the 
Allied  fleets  had  destroyed  the  forts  at  the  entrance  of 
the  straits  on  February  19th,  there  was  a  lively  exodus 
from  the  city. 

The  British  War  Council  had  considered  on  Novem- 
ber 25,  1 914,  the  question  of  forcing  the  Dardanelles. 
Many  Allied  war  vessels  were  already  in  the  Eastern 
Mediterranean.  They  still  enjoyed  complete  freedom 
of  movement  there,  since  German  and  Austrian  sub- 
marines had  not  yet  made  their  way  out  of  the  Adriatic. 


The  Tragedy  of  Gallipoli  183 

The  Queen  Elizabeth,  with  her  15-inch  guns,  was  dis- 
patched to  the  JEgean  to  enhance  the  superiority  of 
the  fleet's  armament  over  the  semi-obsolete  armament 
of  the  forts. 

It  was  intended  originally  to  make  a  joint  land  and 
sea  attack.  The  troops  were  to  come  from  Egypt 
where  the  British  were  awaiting  a  Turkish  attempt 
to  rush  the  Suez  Canal.  Egypt  was  heavily  garri- 
soned and  it  was  a  simple  matter  to  transport  an  army 
from  Alexandria  to  bases  in  the  ^Egean  Islands.  It 
was  also  just  as  feasible  to  defend  Egypt  by  fighting 
the  Turk  at  Gallipoli  as  by  fighting  him  in  the  Sinai 
Desert. 

Earl  Kitchener,  the  British  Secretary  of  State  for 
War,  who  exercised  an  autocratic  control  over  military 
affairs,  announced  in  January,  after  the  Russian  appeal 
arrived,  that  there  were  no  troops  immediately  avail- 
able for  the  Dardanelles  operation.  So,  on  January 
13th,  the  British  War  Council  decided  to  risk  a  purely 
naval  attack.  By  the  first  week  in  February  the 
Allies  had  concentrated  off  the  island  of  Imbros  one 
super-dreadnought,  the  Queen  Elizabeth;  one  battle- 
cruiser,  the  Inflexible;  sixteen  pre-dreadnoughts  and 
nine  cruisers  (all  of  the  above  British) ;  seven  pre- 
dreadnoughts  and  three  cruisers  (French),  and  one 
Russian    cruiser.       There    was   an   adequate    comple- 


184    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

ment   of   destroyers,    mine-sweepers,    and   submarines. 

The  Dardanelles  passage  is  about  sixty  miles  long. 
At  the  ^gean  end  it  is  about  two  miles  wide.  Here 
the  Turks  had  some  antiquated  fortifications  on  the 
opposite  sides  of  the  entrance.  They  were  incapable 
of  defence  and  were  quickly  knocked  to  pieces  by  the 
Allied  fleet,  standing  eight  or  nine  miles  out  to  sea. 
Inside  the  entrance  the  straits  broaden  out  to  perhaps 
four  miles.  Then  they  gradually  contract.  About 
fourteen  miles  up  are  the  Dardanelles  narrows.  Here 
the  passage  is  only  a  mile  wide,  and  hills  rise  abruptly 
from  the  shores.  This  stretch,  ideal  for  defensive 
purposes,  was  studded  with  forts.  It  constituted  the 
main  barrier  to  the  sea  of  Marmora.  A  mine  field 
stretched  down  through  the  narrows  into  the  lower 
part  of  the  straits. 

The  most  important  Turkish  fortification  was  the 
Anadolu  Hamidieh  battery,  on  the  Anatolian  side. 
It  was  situated  on  an  elevation  near  Nagara  Point, 
facing  south,  and  commanded  the  whole  lower  stretch 
of  the  straits.  Its  guns  were  of  the  Krupp  model  of 
1885,  and  had  an  extreme  range  of  about  nine  miles. 
About  three  miles  farther  south,  on  the  Anatolian 
side,  was  the  Dardanos  battery,  of  Krupp  guns  of  the 
model  of  1 905,  reinforced  by  some  naval  guns  taken 
from  the  Goeben  and  from  the  Turkish  war  vessels, 


The  Tragedy  of  Gallipoli  185 

laid  up  off  Constantinople.  The  batteries  on  the 
European  shore  were  of  minor  importance. 

The  fortifications  at  the  entrance  to  the  straits  were 
destroyed  on  February  19th.  Thereafter  the  Allied 
ships  moved  into  the  straits,  sweeping  the  mines  and 
bombarding  the  Turkish  forts  from  Dardanos  north. 
The  Allied  guns  outranged  the  Turkish  by  one  or  two 
miles  and  the  ships  were  able  to  keep  beyond  the 
danger  line.  But  they  made  little  impression  on  the 
Turkish  batteries  by  this  long-distance  bombardment. 

The  first  and  only  real  effort  to  close  in  came  on 
March  18th.  The  attack  was  a  surprise  to  the  world 
at  large,  which  had  come  to  the  conclusion  that  the 
Allied  fleet  was  being  used  merely  to  clear  the  way  for 
a  land  expedition.  The  tradition  had  been  established 
tha4"  no  fleet  could  safely  destroy  or  run  modern  land 
batteries. 

The  results  of  the  assault  of  March  18th  seemed  to 
confirm  this  theory.  The  Allies  lost  three  pre-dread- 
noughts— the  French  Bouvet  and  the  British  Irresistible 
and  Ocean.  All  these  were  sunk  by  mines,  although 
the  Bouvet  was  also  hit  by  shells  from  Hamidieh.  The 
British  battle-cruiser  Inflexible  and  the  French  pre- 
dreadnought  Gaulois  were  also  damaged  by  gun  fire. 

The  losses,  which  were  at  once  admitted,  caused 
great  concern.     But  they  were  less  serious  than  they 


186    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

seemed  to  be.  Goltz  had  fixed  the  price  of  a 
successful  attack  at  ten  ships.  Moreover,  the  all-day 
action  of  March  18th  had  greatly  improved  the  fleet's 
chances.  For  the  real  justification  of  the  Allied  attack 
was  the  well-founded  presumption  that  the  Turks  were 
short  of  munitions.  The  Allies  could  replace  the  ships 
which  were  sunk;  but  the  Turks  could  not  replace 
the  shells  which  had  been  shot  away. 

I   wrote  in  an  article  which  appeared  in  the  New 
York  Tribune  of  March  21 ,  191 5: 

The  Allied  fleet  has  today  a  clearer  idea  of  the 
difficulties  ahead  of  it.  Yet  the  losses  it  has  suffered 
do  not  prove  that  it  is  unequal  to  the  task  of  reducing 
the  forts  and  forcing  a  passage  of  the  straits.  The 
three  battleships  lost  were  sunk  by  mines  floating 
out  on  a  swift  current.  The  guns  of  the  forts  have 
apparently  not  yet  seriously  damaged  a  single  big 
warship. 

The  fleet  has  the  advantage  in  range  and  weight 
of  projectiles.  If  it  takes  its  time,  it  can  destroy 
the  forts  bit  by  bit.  But  that  the  Turks  have  a 
sufficient  supply  of  ammunition  for  their  land  bat- 
teries is  a  pretty  extravagant  assumption.  Every 
day  of  hard  fighting  will  bring  the  stock  in  hand 
nearer  to  the  point  of  exhaustion,  and  if  the  forts 
fail  the  mine  fields  can  be  easily  reached  and  cleared. 

That   was   unorthodox   in   judgment   and   doctrine. 
From  the  standpoint  of  current  naval  opinion  the  Allied 


The  Tragedy  of  Gallipoli  187 

withdrawal  seemed  at  the  time  to  prove  it  unsound. 
But  testimony  which  has  come  to  light  later  shows  that 
it  was  perfectly  sound.  Ambassador  Morgenthau,  in 
his  volume  of  reminiscences,  candidly  exposes  the  hope- 
less situation  of  the  Turkish  defence  on  March  19th. 
He  had  visited  and  inspected  the  Dardanelles  forts  on 
March  15th  and  16th.  He  talked  freely  with  the 
Turkish  commanders  and  officials,  having  made  the 
trip  as  the  guest  of  Enver  Pasha.  He  also  had  other 
sources  of  information.     He  writes: 

Let  us  suppose  that  the  Allies  had  returned,  say 
on  the  morning  of  the  19th,  what  would  have  hap- 
pened? The  one  overwhelming  fact  is  that  the  for- 
tifications were  very  short  of  ammunition.  They 
had  almost  reached  the  limit  of  their  resisting  power 
when  the  British  fleet  passed  out  on  the  afternoon 
of  the  1 8th.  I  had  secured  permission  for  Mr.  George 
A.  Schreiner,  the  well-known  American  correspond- 
ent of  the  Associated  Press,  to  visit  the  Dardanelles 
on  this  occasion.  On  the  night  of  the  18th  this 
correspondent  discussed  the  situation  with  General 
Mertens,  who  was  chief  technical  officer  at  the  straits. 
General  Mertens  admitted  that  the  outlook  was  very 
discouraging  for  the  defence. 

"We  expect  that  the  British  will  come  back  early 
tomorrow  morning,"  he  said,  "and  if  they  do,  we 
may  be  able  to  hold  out  for  a  few  hours." 

General  Mertens  did  not  declare  in  so  many  words 
that  the  ammunition  was  practically  exhausted,  but 
Mr.   Schreiner  discovered  that  such  was  the  case. 


1 88    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

The  fact  was  that  Fort  Hamidieh,  the  most  powerful 
defence  on  the  Asiatic  side,  had  just  seventeen 
armour-piercing  shells  left,  while  at  Kilid-ul-Bahr, 
which  was  the  main  defence  on  the  European  side, 
there  were  precisely  ten. 

"I  should  advise  you  to  get  up  at  six  o'clock  to- 
morrow morning,"  said  General  Mertens,  "and  take 
to  the  Anatolian  Hills.  That's  what  we  are  going 
to  do." 

Mr.  Schreiner  in  his  book,  Berlin  to  Bagdad,  tells  the 
same  story  in  slightly  different  words.  He  reports 
Mertens  as  saying: 

It'll  go  bad  with  us  if  the  Allies  return  tomorrow. 
They  have  lost  heavily  today,  to  be  sure.  But  I 
think  I  know  the  British  well  enough  to  feel  that 
they  will  be  back  bright  and  early.  If  you  have 
anything  around  here  you  wish  to  save,  take  my 
advice  and  pack  it  tonight.  Be  ready  to  get  out 
of  here  early  in  the  morning. 

What  deterred  the  Allied  fleet  from  going  back? 
Vice-Admiral  Carden  was  sick  when  the  attack  was 
made.  Vice-Admiral  de  Robeck,  who  commanded  in 
his  place,  wrote  in  a  report,  made  on  March  19th: 

The  power  of  the  fleet  to  dominate  the  fortresses 
by  superiority  of  fire  seems  to  be  established.  Vari- 
ous other  dangers  and  difficulties  will  have  to  be 
encountered,  but  nothing  has  happened  which  justi- 
fies the  belief  that  the  loss  of  the  undertaking  will  ex- 
ceed what  has  always  been  expected  and  provided  for. 


The  Tragedy  of  Gallipoli  189 

Had  this  judgment  been  acted  on,  Constantinople 
would  have  fallen;  for  there  was  nothing  to  stop  the 
Allied  warships  after  Fort  Hamidieh  and  Nagara  Point 
had  been  passed. 

Probably  the  deterrent  influence  was  that  extreme 
disinclination  to  risk  naval  losses  which  prevailed 
among  the  technical  advisers  of  the  First  Lord  of  the 
British  Admiralty.  Lord  Fisher,  who  originally  op- 
posed the  Dardanelles  venture,  stated  the  theory  of 
the  naval  experts  in  a  memorandum  which  he  prepared 
for  Premier  Asquith  in  January,  191 5.     He  said: 

The  sole  justification  of  bombardments  and  attacks 
of  the  fleet  on  fortified  places,  such  as  the  Dar- 
danelles, is  to  force  a  decision  at  sea.  As  long  as  the 
German  High  Sea  fleet  possesses  its  present  strength 
and  splendid  gunnery  efficiency,  so  long  it  is  impera- 
tive that  no  operation  be  undertaken  by  the  British 
fleet  calculated  to  impair  its  superiority,  which  is 
none  too  great,  in  view  of  the  heavy  losses  already 
experienced  in  ships  and  men,  which  latter  cannot 
be  filled  in  the  period  of  the  war,  in  which  the  navy 
differs  materially  from  the  army.  Even  the  older 
ships  should  not  be  risked,  for  they  cannot  be  lost 
without  losing  men  and  they  form  the  only  reserve 
behind  the  Great  Fleet. 

This  was  a  counsel  of  overcaution.  The  Allied  fleets 
were  always  greatly  superior  to  the  Teuton  fleets.  The 
loss  of  a  dozen  pre-dreadnoughts  in   the  Dardanelles 


190    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

was  of  infinitesimal  consequence  compared  with  the 
military  advantages  which  would  have  resulted  from 
the  opening  of  the  straits.  Renunciation  of  the  attack 
cose  the  Allies  billions  of  treasure  and  hundreds  of 
thousands  of  lives.  The  few  obsolescent  vessels  spared 
made  Great  Britain's  naval  superiority  no  more  secure, 
and  contributed  practically  nothing  toward  assuring 
the  Entente's  success  through  the  exercise  of  its  superior 
naval  power. 

A  faint  heart  somewhere  let  slip  through  British 
fingers  a  victory  which  would  have  been  as  far-reaching 
in  its  results  as  Trafalgar.  It  also  put  on  Great  Britain 
the  burden  of  resorting  to  a  land  attack  to  force  the 
straits.  Acceptance  of  defeat  by  the  navy  greatly 
weakened  British  prestige  in  the  East.  In  order  to 
restore  it  the  army  had  to  be  called  in. 

A  land  operation  against  Constantinople  presented 
many  more  difficulties  than  a  naval  operation  did. 
British  naval  organization  was  efficient.  In  the  winter 
of  191 4-1 5  British  military  organization  was  far  from 
efficient.  Much  time  would  necessarily  be  lost  getting 
a  sufficient  army  to  Gallipoli.  And  the  Turks  could 
assemble  more  troops  there  in  a  given  time  than  the 
British  could. 

To  have  a  fair  chance  of  success  the  land  attack 
should  have  come  as  a  surprise  and  should  have  been 


The  Tragedy  of  Gallipoli  191 

coincidental  with  the  naval  attack.  On  February  16th, 
a  month  after  the  decision  to  use  the  fleet  without 
waiting  for  the  army  had  been  reached,  the  British 
War  Council  determined  to  make  a  land  campaign 
against  Constantinople.  But  four  days  later  Earl 
Kitchener  postponed  the  departure  of  the  29th  Divi- 
sion from  England,  without  even  letting  the  War  Coun- 
cil know  about  it.  This  caused  a  delay  of  three  weeks 
in  the  arrival  of  the  full  expeditionary  force.  It  in- 
evitably reduced  the  chances  of  a  surprise  descent  on 
the  Turkish  positions. 

The  Allies  in  the  beginning  sent  about  120,000  men 
to  the  Dardanelles.  One  Australian  and  one  New 
Zealand  division  were  transferred  from  Egypt.  With 
them  came  East  Indians  and  British  Territorials.  A 
British  naval  division  and  the  29th  Division  arrived 
from  England.  The  French  could  spare  but  few  troops. 
They  provided  some  marines,  colonials,  and  foreign 
legion  detachments.  The  French  forces  under  General 
d'Amade  made  a  lodgment  on  the  Asiatic  side  of  the 
entrance  to  the  straits.  They  were  subsequently 
transferred  to  the  European  side. 

The  Allied  army  was  put  ashore  on  April  25th,  more 
than  five  weeks  after  the  naval  attack  had  been  sus- 
pended. The  plan  of  General  Ian  Hamilton,  the  Brit- 
ish commander,  was  to  get  a  foothold  at  the  tip  of  the 


192    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

peninsula  and  on  the  ^Egean  shore  a  little  farther  up. 
Then  the  two  British  forces  would  work  north  and 
east,  converging  on  the  Kilid  Bahr  Plateau,  which 
dominated  the  forts  in  the  Narrows. 

The  great  obstacle  to  the  success  of  this  plan  was 
the  configuration  of  the  Gallipoli  peninsula.  There 
were  few  landing  places  where  shelter  was  available, 
either  for  the  lighters  offshore  or  the  troops  on  the 
beaches.  Excessive  losses  occurred  in  the  course  of 
the  landing  operations.  And  after  the  troops  had 
established  themselves  in  unsatisfactory  positions 
ashore,  they  found  their  road  north  and  east  barred 
by  Turkish  infantry,  holding  higher  ground,  admirably 
adapted  to  defence. 

The  British  advanced  a  few  miles  from  the  extreme 
tip  of  the  peninsula  but  were  held  before  Achi  Baba 
Heights.  The  Anzacs  (Australians  and  New  Zealand- 
ers)  made  a  little  progress  east  toward  Sari  Bahr. 
Then  a  trench  war  deadlock  ensued.  Toward  the  end 
of  May  German  submarines  appeared  in  the  ^Egean  and 
the  Allied  fleet  had  to  take  to  cover,  thus  depriving  the 
army  of  the  artillery  support  which  would  have  been 
needed  to  launch  a  powerful  break-through  operation 
like  that  at  Neuve  Chapelle. 

At  this  point  the  British  War  Council  would  have 
been  justified  in   cutting  losses  and   drawing   out  of 


The  Tragedy  of  Gallipoli  193 

Gallipoli.  But  the  doggedness  it  had  failed  to  show  in 
using  the  navy  in  the  straits,  it  now  showed  in  using 
the  army  on  the  peninsula.  Six  more  divisions  were 
dispatched  to  support  the  six  originally  sent.  It  was 
decided  to  make  another  attack  from  a  point  still 
farther  north — at  Suvla  Bay — thus  taking  the  Turkish 
position  opposite  the  Anzacs  in  the  flank  and  rear. 

This  was  a  sensible  idea.  It  was  also  a  fortunate 
one;  for  the  Turks  were  caught  napping.  With  bet- 
ter staff  organization  and  more  competent  leadership 
General  Ian  Hamilton  might  easily  have  enveloped 
and  crushed  the  Turks  at  Sari  Bahr  as  Allenby 
enveloped  and  crushed  them  north  of  Jerusalem  in 
September,   191 8. 

But  the  British  army  had  not  yet  learned  how  to 
make  war.  The  great  opportunity  at  Suvla  was  frit- 
tered away  by  generals  who  didn't  realize  the  value 
of  time.  The  troops  fought  heroically  and  captured 
positions  which,  if  held  by  proper  reinforcements, 
would  have  put  the  British  in  sight  of  the  Dardanelles 
narrows. 

The  Suvla  Bay  operation  began  on  August  6th  and 
lasted  until  August  nth  or  12th.  When  it  was  over 
General  Hamilton  appealed  to  the  British  Govern- 
ment for  more  troops.  But  the  War  Council  was  now 
through.     The   army   was   allowed    to   stay    on    until 


194    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

December — a  part  of  it  into  January,  191 6.  But  all 
thought  of  an  offensive  against  Constantinople  was 
abandoned. 

The  Dardanelles-Gallipoli  expedition  was  thus  one 
long  train  of  mishaps.  A  bold  and  sound  strategical 
conception  was  wrecked  by  persistent  faults  .n  execu- 
tion. The  British  losses  were  ghastly  in  comparison 
with  the  results  achieved.  The  killed,  wounded,  and 
missing  numbered  about  115,000.  Nearly  100,000 
more  men  were  incapacitated  at  one  time  or  another 
by  sickness.  Because  of  its  deplorable  and  costly 
failure  many  Allied  writers  described  it  as  a  piece  of 
military  madness  and  denounced  its  promoters,  chief 
among  whom  was  Winston  Churchill,  as  bungling 
amateur  strategists. 

Gallipoli  was  long  used  by  the  "Westerners"  as  a 
crushing  example  of  the  folly  of  diverting  any  of  Great 
Britain's  military  strength  to  Eastern  fronts.  The 
attitude  of  the  "Westerners"  was  that  the  Entente 
was  entitled  to  do  nothing  in  any  other  part  of  the 
world  which  might  weaken  Allied  defensives  or  offen- 
sives in  France  and  Belgium.  This  view  was  expressed 
unconditionally  by  Major-General  Sir  Frederick  Mau- 
rice, in  an  article  on  "The  Eastern  and  Western  Con- 
troversy" in  The  Contemporary  Review,  for  December, 
191 8.     General   Maurice,  who  was  formerly  Director 


The  Tragedy  of  Gallipoli  195 

of    Military    Operations    in    the    British    War    Office, 
said: 

There  was  every  justification  for  the  Dardanelles 
expedition,  provided  sufficient  force  to  carry  it  through 
successfully  could  be  made  available  without  prejudice 
to  the  security  of  the  Western  Front.  There  was  no 
such  military  force  available  in  the  spring  of  191 5. 

It  would  be  wrong  to  say  that  the  Dardanelles 
expedition  achieved  no  results,  for  it  undoubtedly 
contributed  materially  to  the  exhaustion  of  Turkey 
and  detained  around  Constantinople  large  Turkish 
forces  which  might  otherwise  have  been  attacking 
us  in  Egypt  or  Mesopotamia,  or  assisting  the  Ger- 
mans in  Russia.  But  the  results  obtained  were  in 
no  way  commensurate  with  the  expenditure  of  force 
and  there  can  be  little  doubt  that  if  the  expedition 
had  never  been  undertaken,  victory  on  the  Western 
Front  would  have  been  obtained  much  sooner. 

The  fixed  idea  of  the  British  "Westerners"  shines 
out  in  those  judgments.  Yet  the  mistake  of  the  British 
Government  in  191 5  was  not  in  sending  too  many  men 
to  Gallipoli,  but  in  sending  too  few.  The  security  of 
the  Western  Front  was  not  imperilled  by  the  dispatch 
of  British  troops  to  the  ^Egean.  It  would  not  have 
been  imperilled  even  if  British  reserves  in  France  had 
been  sent  east.  For  Germany  went  on  the  defensive 
in  the  West  in  January,  191 5,  and  remained  on  the 
defensive  there  until  February  21,  1916.  The  second 
German  attack  on  Ypres,  in  April,  191 5,  was  only  a 


196    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

local  operation  intended  to  distract  attention  from  the 
Teuton  concentration  in  Galicia.  Neuve  Chapelle 
and  Loos — the  two  British  West  Front  offensives  of 
19 1 5 — were  just  as  futile  operations  as  the  operation 
at  Gallipoli. 

There  was  a  chance  in  the  East  in  191 5  to  alter  the 
whole  character  of  the  war.  There  was  no  such  chance 
in  the  West.  Germany  boldly  seized  her  opportunity 
and  nearly  destroyed  the  Russian  armies.  The  Allies 
embraced  theirs  half-heartedly  and  failed  to  take  Con- 
stantinople. Allied  operations  on  the  West  Front  in 
1915  led  to  nothing.  They  were  only  "nibbles."  But 
control  of  the  Balkans  and  the  Near  East  and  Russian 
ability  to'  remain  in  the  war  were  in  the  balance  in  the 
fighting  at  the  Dardanelles  and  in  the  Gallipoli  gulches. 

So  far  as  the  Entente  of  191 5  was  concerned  it  never 
had  the  power  to  compel  a  decision  on  the  Western 
Front.  Every  single  soldier  who  fought  at  Gallipoli 
could  have  been  added  to  Sir  John  French's  armies 
in  Flanders  without  hastening  an  Entente  victory  in 
the  West.  The  Entente,  without  the  United  States, 
might  have  won  the  war  by  linking  up  the  Western 
and  Russian  fronts.  It  probably  could  not  have  won 
it  in  the  West,  after  Russia's  collapse,  except  through 
American  assistance. 

When  Russia  was  forced  out  of  the  struggle  the  full 


The  Tragedy  of  Gallipoli  197 

strategic  significance  of  the  Dardanelles  expedition 
became  apparent  to  the  English  public.  An  account- 
ing was  demanded.  A  commission,  headed  by  Lord 
Cromer,  made  an  investigation  and  submitted  a  report 
on  March  8,  1917.  It  became  apparent  from  the 
evidence  gathered  that  in  191 4  and  the  early  part  of 
191 5  Earl  Kitchener  was  the  sole  arbiter  of  British 
military  policy.  He  dominated  the  War  Council — 
and  usually  ignored  it.  Mr.  Churchill  described  him 
as  "all-powerful,  imperturbable,  and  reserved."  Every- 
body bowed  down  to  him.  "Scarcely  any  one  even 
ventured  to  argue  with  him  in  the  Council,"  Mr. 
Churchill  testified. 

Kitchener  had  too  many  irons  in  the  fire;  and  his 
military  capacity  proved  to  be  limited.  He  was  of 
the  stuff  of  which  most  popular  idols  are  made.  The 
British  public  knew  only  the  Kitchener  of  Khartoum, 
the  Kitchener  of  myth ;  and  the  politicians  and  soldiers 
who  came  in  contact  with  him  also  weakly  accepted 
him  for  a  while  at  the  public's  valuation. 

As  the  commission  could  not  help  discovering,  he 
undertook  more  than  he  could  possibly  accomplish 
and  his  administration  of  the  War  Office  was  marked 
by  confusion  and  inefficiency.  He,  therefore,  was 
more  responsible  than  any  one  else  for  the  lack  of  co- 
operation at  the  Dardanelles  between  the  army  and  the 


198    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

navy  and  for  the  bungling  of  the  one  great  strategic 
opportunity  which  presented  itself  to  the  Entente 
Powers. 

Kitchener  was  not  the  man  to  direct  a  resolute  and 
carefully  organized  operation  such  as  was  necessary  to 
eject  the  Turks  from  the  Gallipoli  peninsula.  Under 
him,  as  was  testified  by  Major-General  Charles  E. 
Callwell,  Director  of  Military  Operations  in  19 15,  the 
General  Staff  had  "virtually  ceased  to  exist."  Great 
Britain  could  send  to  Gallipoli  some  of  the  best  troops 
in  the  world.  But  she  was  woefully  lacking  at  that 
time  in  the  staff  machinery  needed  to  get  results  out 
of  them. 

There  are  two  phases  of  the  Gallipoli  tragedy  which 
will  always  stand  out  blackest.  One  is  the  sacrifice 
to  inexperience  and  incompetency  in  leadership  of 
splendid  troops  like  the  Anzacs.  The  other  is  the 
heart-breaking  decision  not  to  send  the  Allied  fleet  back 
into  the  Narrows  on  March  19th,  when  the  Hamidieh 
and  Kilid-ul-Bahr  batteries  had  between  them  only 
twenty-seven  armour-piercing  shells  left. 


CHAPTER  XI 

THE   CREATION   OF   MITTEL-EUROPA 

In  both  the  political  and  the  military  sense  Germany's 
vital  need  was  always  to  secure  her  Continental  posi- 
tion. Before  William  II  's  time  this  need  had  been 
kept  steadfastly  in  view.  Prussia  fought  the  wars  of 
1864,  1866,  and  1870  in  order  to  consolidate  the  German 
states  under  her  leadership.  Bismarck  constructed  the 
Triple  Alliance  in  order  to  extend  German  power  over 
Central  Europe.  Mittel-Europa  was  not  an  inven- 
tion of  the  latter-day  Pan-Germans.  It  was  a  natural 
outgrowth  of  German  opportunities  and  ambitions. 

In  191 4  Germany  thought  the  time  had  come  for 
further  territorial  expansion.  The  line  of  least  resis- 
tance was  to  the  south  and  east.  All  the  materials  of 
Empire  lay  there.  As  the  dominant  partner  in 
the  Triple  Alliance,  Germany  had  reduced  Austria- 
Hungary  from  the  status  of  an  equal  to  that  of  a  de- 
pendent. Neither  the  Austrians  nor  the  Hungarians 
loved  the  Germans.     But  they  both  needed   German 

backing  in  order  to  maintain  their  grip  on  the  subject 

199 


200    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

races  of  the  Dual  Monarchy.  Eastern  and  South-east- 
ern Europe  was  the  home  of  many  small,  long-sub- 
merged peoples.  It  could  make  little  difference  to  them 
whether  they  remained  under  Austrian,  Hungarian  or 
Russian  rule,  or  were  absorbed  into  an  enlarged  Ger- 
man Empire.  On  the  other  hand,  the  populations  of 
the  more  advanced  Western  European  states,  whose 
territory  Germany  coveted,  would  be  extremely  diffi- 
cult to  assimilate,  as  German  experience  with  Alsace- 
Lorraine  had  glaringly  demonstrated. 

Germany's  immediate  future  lay  in  the  east  of  Europe, 
not  in  the  west  or  overseas.  When  she  turned  her 
armies  east  in  January,  191 5,  and  began  the  construc- 
tion of  a  vast  central,  Teutonized  state,  stretching  well 
into  Russia  and  south-east  across  the  Bosporus  toward 
the  Gulf  of  Persia,  she  obeyed  a  sound  political  and 
military  instinct.  There  is  little  to  show,  however, 
that  her  leaders  were  clearly  conscious  of  the  larger 
purposes  of  the  Eastern  campaign.  With  the  General 
Staff,  now  reorganized  under  Falkenhayn,  it  seemed  to 
be  rather  a  question  of  going  to  the  rescue  of  Austria- 
Hungary,  recovering  Galicia,  seizing  Poland,  and  secur- 
ing East  Prussia  from  Russian  invasion,  before  turning 
back  for  a  military  decision  in  the  West.  Falkenhayn 
was  a  convinced  Westerner  and  remained  one  until 
he  followed  Moltke  into  disgrace. 


The  Creation  of  Mittel-Europa     201 

He  could  see,  however,  the  absolute  necessity  of 
driving  the  Russian  armies  out  of  Western  Galicia 
and  clearing  the  Carpathian  front.  Austria  and 
Hungary  both  demanded  that  modicum  of  relief. 
Italy  had  also  begun  to  press  Vienna  for  territorial 
concessions.  Berlin  was  called  in  as  a  broker  and  the 
German  Government  had  every  reason  to  believe  that 
Italy's  demands  were  only  a  prelude  to  war.  And 
Austria  could  not  defend  her  south-eastern  border  if 
the  danger  of  a  Russian  break-through  in  the  north- 
east were  not  removed.  Italy  did  enter  the  war  before 
long — on  May  23,  1915.  But  by  the  time  the  Italians 
could  organize  their  offensive  against  Trent  and  Trieste 
Lemberg  had  fallen  and  the  Russian  armies  in  Galicia 
and  Poland  were  already  in  headlong  retreat. 

After  the  fall  of  Przemysl  on  March  22,  191 5,  General 
Brusiloff  had  pushed  through  the  Dukla  Pass  and  nearly 
through  the  Lupkow  Pass  in  the  Western  Carpathians. 
East  of  Cracow  the  Russian  lines  had  been  drawn  back 
to  and  beyond  the  Dunajec  River.  The  Russian  posi- 
tions here  ran  north  through  the  Carpathian  foothills, 
following  the  valley  of  the  Biala  River  to  its  junction 
with  the  Dunajec,  near  Tarnow,  and  thence  up  the 
Dunajec  to  the  Vistula. 

The  Germans  had  failed  all  through  the  winter  and 
early  spring  to  break  through  the  Russian  defence  in 


202    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Poland.  Now  they  decided  to  crush  the  front  held 
by  General  Radko  Dimitrieff's  army,  facing  Cracow. 
Success  here  would  put  them  in  the  rear  of  the  Russians 
at  the  Dukla  and  Lupkow  passes  and  thus  compel  a 
Russian  retirement  toward  Przemysl. 

General  Mackensen  was  entrusted  with  the  Dunajec 
operation.  Four  months  were  spent  in  preparing  the 
blow.  They  were  well  spent.  For  Mackensen  was 
to  cut  away  from  the  old  offensive  methods  which  had 
proved  so  costly  and  ineffective  in  Poland,  as  well  as 
in  Flanders.  He  was  to  invent  a  new  tactics  of  assault, 
based  on  the  enormous  development  of  the  offensive 
power  of  artillery.  He  was  to  end  the  stagnation  of 
trench  warfare,  so  far,  at  least,  as  the  Eastern  Front 
was  concerned.  It  was  his  business  to  forge  an  instru- 
ment by  which  Russia's  vast  superiority  in  crude  man 
power  could  be  easily  offset.  He  therefore  set  about 
introducing  a  mechanicalized  form  of  warfare  in  which 
Russia  could  not  hope  to  compete  with  Germany,  since 
she  lacked  then,  and  would  lack  for  a  long  time  there- 
after, the  big  guns  and  the  munitions  stocks  with  which 
Germany  was  to  win  her  impressive  and  inexpensive 
victories. 

The  battle  of  the  Dunajec  stands  out  in  the  history 
of  the  war  not  only  because  it  started  the  long  Russian 
retreat  to  the  Dvina  River  and  the  Pripet  Marshes, 


The  Creation  of  Mittel-Europa    203 

but  also  because  it  struck  a  new  balance  in  values 
between  the  offensive  and  the  defensive.  Rigid  trench 
warfare  had  paralyzed  the  offence.  It  had  made  simply 
murderous  the  old-fashioned  mass  attack,  following 
old-fashioned  artillery  preparation.  The  British  offen- 
sive at  Neuve  Chapelle  in  March,  191 5,  indicated  what 
massed  and  intensified  artillery  fire — "drum  fire" — 
could  do  to  an  enemy  holding  an  ordinary  trench  line. 
But  the  infantry  follow-up  at  Neuve  Chapelle  had  been 
a  complete  failure. 

Mackensen  proved  in  Galicia,  too,  that  a  sufficient 
artillery  concentration  could  completely  destroy  sur- 
face trenches.  He  also  proved  that  picked  infantry 
could  drive  through  all  the  trench  lines  of  an  enemy 
shaken  by  a  tremendous  bombardment.  The  Macken- 
sen "phalanx,"  the  forerunner  of  the  Falkenhayn  and 
Hutier  "shock  troop"  formations,  became  as  famous 
as  Mackensen's  mobile  heavy  batteries,  doing  field 
artillery  service. 

The  British  at  Neuve  Chapelle  attacked  a  one-mile 
front,  using  three  hundred  big  guns.  Mackensen 
massed  about  two  thousand  guns  on  a  front  of  several 
miles.  The  German  official  reports  fix  the  length  of 
the  line  broken  through  on  May  2d  at  eleven  miles. 
But  the  fire  was  largely  concentrated  on  the  enemy's 
centre  before  Gorlice.     The  bombardment  lasted  four 


204    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

hours  and  when  the  support  troops  moved  forward 
there  were  no  Russian  trenches  left.  Dimitrieff's  army 
melted  away.  The  Biala  River  line,  in  front  of  Gorlice, 
was  completely  uncovered.  Nor  was  Dimitrieff  able 
to  make  a  stand  at  the  next  river,  the  Wisloka,  or  at  the 
Wistok,  still  farther  back. 

BrusilofT's  rear  was  now  exposed.  By  a  rapid  retreat 
he  extricated  himself,  losing  only  one  division.  His 
army  and  Dimitrieff's  eventually  rallied  on  the  line  of  the 
lower  San.  But  the  Russians  couldn't  hold  on  that 
line.  They  lost  Jaroslav  and  Przemysl  and  retreated 
again  in  confusion  to  positions  covering  Lemberg. 

The  battle  of  the  Dunajec  and  the  operations  di- 
rectly following  it  lost  the  Russians  well  over  one  hun- 
dred thousand  prisoners.  Yet  conditions  which  applied 
only  on  the  Eastern  Front  had  made  Mackensen's 
new  offensive  method  seem  more  destructive  and  ir- 
resistible than  it  really  was.  It  caught  the  Russian 
armies  at  a  moment  when  their  fighting  strength  was 
fast  ebbing  away.  German  power  in  artillery  was 
magnified  by  extraordinary  Russian  weakness  in  that 
all-important  arm. 

The  Russian  armies  began  the  war  relatively  better 
armed  and  better  supplied  with  munitions  than  they 
had  been  in  any  previous  war.  The  army  reforms  af- 
ter the  Japanese  campaigns  had  borne  fruit.     But  no 


The  Creation  of  Mittel-Europa     205 

European  General  Staff  had  clearly  foreseen  the  re- 
quirements of  a  war  of  nations.  And  when  it  came 
to  making  up  unexpected  deficiencies  Russia  was  at 
an  enormous  disadvantage  because  of  her  isolated 
position  and  her  backwardness  industrially. 

In  the  early  months  of  1914  there  were  plenty  of 
rifles  and  machine  guns.  The  Russian  field  artillery 
was  excellent  in  quality  and  lavishly  served.  Com- 
petent Austrian  military  writers  like  Roda-Roda  noted 
that  the  Russian  field  artillery  at  that  time  was  su- 
perior to  the  Austrian  and  expressed  great  surprise  at 
so  unwelcome  a  discovery. 

But  Russia  had  not  anticipated  the  enormous  wast- 
age of  eight  months  of  almost  continuous  fighting.  By 
the  spring  of  191 5  infantry  reinforcements  were  arriv- 
ing at  the  front  unarmed.  Rifles  had  already  been 
taken  away  from  the  supply  and  transport  organiza- 
tions. Now  they  had  to  be  taken  away  from  the 
reserves  in  the  training  areas.  Before  this  period  no 
rifles  had  been  salvaged  on  the  battlefields.  By  the 
end  of  191 5  the  effects  of  the  crisis  in  small  arms  de- 
liveries were  shown  in  the  fact  that  the  Russian  troops 
in  the  firing  line  were  using  four  kinds  of  rifles — Rus- 
sian, Austrian,  Japanese,  and  Mexican.  Troops  in  the 
rear  were  using  French,  English,  and  Italian  types  and 
old  Berdan  rifles,  with  lead  bullets. 


206    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

At  the  beginning  of  the  war  each  infantry  regiment 
had  eight  machine  guns.  This  allotment  was  increased 
in  the  case  of  some  regiments.  But  with  the  multi- 
plication of  regiments  the  higher  ratio  was  difficult  to 
maintain  and  the  supply  of  machine  gun  ammunition 
was  often  short.  Notwithstanding  these  handicaps 
the  Russian  infantry  generally  made  a  good  showing 
against  German  and  Austro-Hungarian  infantry.  But 
the  infantry  lacked  proper  artillery  support.  The 
field  artillery  had  shot  away  most  of  its  stock  of  ammu- 
nition by  January,  1915. 

General  Basil  Gourko,  at  one  time  chief  of  the  Rus- 
sian Imperial  Staff  and  at  another  time  commander-in- 
chief  of  the  western  armies,  says  in  his  book,  War  and 
Revolution  in  Russia: 

For  months  [in  191 5]  batteries  in  action  daily 
did  not  receive  more  than  four  shells  per  gun  per  day. 
Empty  parks  were  then  brought  up  and  there  were 
cases  where  a  battery  used  its  last  reserve  stocks. 
An  army  corps  would  receive  no  more  than  one 
thousand  shells  at  one  delivery  and  would  not  know 
the  date  when  another  delivery  would  be  made. 
By  this  time  the  army  commanders  understood  that 
the  shortage  of  munitions  was  not  a  creation  of 
overcaution,  but  a  sad  reality. 

Under-equipment  in  field  artillery  was  of  little  con- 
sequence, so  long  as  there  were  not  enough  shells  to 


The  Creation  of  Mittel-Europa     207 

serve  existing  batteries.  The  real  plight  of  the  Rus- 
sian armies  is  presented  illuminatingly  in  General 
Gourko's  remark  that  there  were  some  compensations 
in  the  dearth  of  ammunition.  For  he  says  that  if 
shells  had  been  supplied  as  lavishly  in  the  winter  of 
191 4-1 5  as  they  were  in  the  first  months  of  the  war, 
there  would  have  been  in  the  spring  of  191 5  hardly  a 
field  gun  left  fit  to  be  fired.  The  Russians  would 
have  been  just  as  unable  to  replace  the  worn-out  pieces 
as  they  were  to  add  to  them  before  they  were  worn  out. 
With  the  heavy  artillery  (which  could  hardly  be 
classified  as  heavy,  when  compared  with  Mackensen's 
monster  howitzers)  the  situation  was  even  worse.  On 
this  point  Gourko  testifies: 


But  if  the  Russian  artillery  had  a  shortage  in  field 
gun  shells  the  lack  of  shells  for  the  heavier  guns  was 
even  more  pronounced.  In  1915  cases  were  known 
where  heavy  batteries  were  sent  to  the  rear  ostensibly 
for  repair,  but  actually  because  of  lack  of  ammuni- 
tion for  them.  This  position  gradually  got  better, 
but  nevertheless  it  was  only  in  the  spring  of  iqij  that 
the  different  armies  were  made  happy  by  being  able 
to  reckon  on  having  several  tens  of  thousands  of 
shells  for  the  six-inch  guns  and  about  one  hundred 
thousand  4.8-inch  trench  mortar  bombs;  and  this 
in  comparison  with  the  hundreds  of  shells  which 
were  supplied  in  1914,  and  even  in  191 5,  might  be 
considered  satisfactory. 


208    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

But  in  the  spring  of  191 7  Russia  was  virtually  out 
of  the  war. 

At  the  battle  of  the  Dunajec  Mackensen's  heavy 
artillery  is  estimated  to  have  used  seven  hundred 
thousand  shells.  And  by  November,  1914,  the  Ger- 
mans were  employing  twelve-inch  guns  in  field  opera- 
tions, while  the  Russians  had  nothing  heavier  than 
six-inch  guns  until  the  spring  of  191 6. 

The  Dunajec  therefore  brutally  uncovered  Russia's 
military  weakness — a  weakness  which  could  not  pos- 
sibly be  overcome  except  through  an  effective  linking 
up  of  the  Eastern  and  Western  Allied  Fronts.  It  was 
evident  after  Dimitrieff's  defeat  at  Gorlice  and  Brusi- 
loff's  retreat  to  Lemberg  that  the  Germans  had  an 
attack  which  the  Russians  were  powerless  to  stop. 
Falkenhayn  could  repeat  the  Dunajec  operation  at 
will  and  force  a  Russian  retirement  eastward  which 
would  end  only  when  the  victors  were  halted  either  by 
political  considerations  or  by  the  physical  difficulties 
of  pursuit. 

After  Przemysl  was  retaken  by  the  Germans  and  the 
San  was  forced  the  Russians  made  a  temporary  stand 
on  the  Grodek  line,  covering  Lemberg.  Mackensen 
didn't  try  to  break  this  line.  He  turned  it  on  the 
northern  end  by  battering  his  way  to  Rawa  Russka, 
where   Russky   had    broken    Auffenberg's    defence    of 


The  Creation  of  Mittel-Europa     209 

Lemberg  in  September,  1914.  The  Galician  capital 
fell  on  June  22d.  Its  loss  and  the  loss  of  Rawa  Russka 
exposed  the  Russian  armies  in  the  Warsaw  salient  to 
a  flank  attack  coming  from  the  south. 

This  salient  was  beyond  the  true  Russian  military 
frontier  and  had  been  held  since  August,  1914,  only 
because  the  Russian  armies  had  covered  it  on  its  weak 
southern  face  by  overrunning  Galicia.  Now  three 
groups  of  German-Austro-Hungarian  armies  were  clos- 
ing in  on  the  enveloped  Polish  angle,  of  which  Warsaw 
was  the  apex.  The  most  dangerous  attack  was  that 
from  the  south,  in  the  direction  of  Lublin.  Lublin 
fell  on  July  30th.  A  few  days  earlier  Hindenburg 
broke  through  the  Narew  River  line,  on  the  northern 
face,  and  Prince  Leopold  of  Bavaria  got  across  the 
Vistula  north  of  Ivangorod.  Warsaw  was  evacuated 
on  August  4th.  By  August  15th  all  the  Russian 
armies  were  out  of  Poland. 

The  Grand  Duke  Nicholas  planned  to  hold  the  Rus- 
sian line  of  mobilization  along  the  Bug  River  through 
Brest-Litovsk  to  Grodno  and  Kovno  and  thence  north 
to  Riga.  But  the  momentum  of  the  German  attack 
could  not  be  checked.  Kovno  surrendered  under 
circumstances  which  suggested  collusion  with  the 
enemy.  The  Brest-Litovsk  line  was  punctured,  and 
a  new  retreat   became   inevitable.     Nicholas  was  re- 


210    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

lieved  of  command  on  September  5th,  and  the  Russian 
armies  drifted  back  under  the  Czar's  orders  until  they 
stood  about  October  1st  on  the  Dvina  River,  east  of 
Vilna,  east  of  the  Pripet  Marshes,  and,  in  the  south, 
between  the  fortresses  of  Rovno  and  Dubno.  In  the 
great  retreat  Russia  had  lost  from  1,000,000  to  1,500,000 
men. 

The  German  pursuit  now  slowed  down.  It  didn't 
stop  because  of  military  exhaustion.  The  German 
hold-up  was  more  or  less  deliberate.  Germany  was 
about  to  turn  south,  where  the  stage  had  been  set  for 
a  spectacular  fall  campaign  in  the  Balkans.  She  had 
dealt  Russia  a  crushing  blow,  from  which  there  would 
be  no  genuine  or  lasting  recovery.  She  had  demon- 
strated her  vast  superiority  in  the  field  in  which 
victory  would  bring  her  the  most  practical  results. 
She  was  satisfied  for  the  present  to  digest  her  Eastern 
conquests. 

If  the  German  military  leaders  had  deliberately 
planned  to  subordinate  all  other  war  aims  to  the  crea- 
tion of  a  Teuton  Mittel-Europa,  the  Russian  campaign 
of  191 5  would  remain  a  monument  to  their  perspicacity. 
It  would  have  blotted  out  the  memory  of  German 
failures  on  the  Western  Front.  It  would  have  proved 
that  the  Great  General  Staff  had  realized  Germany's 
military  limitations  and  had  resolutely  contracted  the 


The  Creation  of  Mittel-Europa     211 

scope  of  the  war,  confining  its  purpose  to  bulwarking 
Germany's  position  in  Central  Europe  and  complet- 
ing in  1914-18  the  work  of  1864,  1866,  and  1870-71. 
But  subsequent  events  disclosed  that  the  German 
High  Command  regarded  the  operations  in  the  East 
simply  as  an  interlude  between  Western  offensives. 

The  Russian  campaign  of  191 5  was  not  altogether 
imposing  as  a  military  achievement.  It  did  not  com- 
pare in  brilliance  to  Foch's  1918  offensive  in  France 
and  Belgium,  to  Franchet  d'Esperey's  in  the  Balkans, 
or  to  Allenby's  in  Palestine.  Given  the  enormous 
technical  superiority  of  the  German  armies,  they 
should  have  accomplished  more.  Falkenhayn  and 
Hindenburg  were  also  pupils  of  Count  Schlieffen. 
They  had  the  Cannae  formula  always  in  mind.  But 
they  didn't  work  it  out  any  more  successfully  than 
Moltke  the  Younger  had  worked  it  out  in  France. 

The  Russian  armies  in  the  Warsaw  salient  were  ripe 
for  envelopment.  At  several  stages  in  the  course  of 
the  great  retreat  they  were  in  extreme  peril.  Macken- 
sen  might  have  blocked  the  road  east  from  Warsaw, 
if  he  had  reached  Lublin  a  little  sooner.  Again  at 
Vilna  where  the  Russians,  under  the  Czar's  urgings, 
made  too  obstinate  a  stand,  Hindenburg  had  them 
surrounded  on  two  sides,  with  his  cavalry  in  their  rear. 
But  the  Russian  tradition  of  steadfastness  and  cool- 


212    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

ness  in  retreat  again  vindicated  itself-  The  cavalry 
divisions  behind  Vilna  could  not  close  the  trap.  The 
Russian  infantry  slipped  out  with  moderate  losses. 

This  failure  to  make  the  Cannae  theory  work  puzzled 
the  German  critics.  One  of  the  frankest  and  most 
competent  of  them,  the  military  writer  of  the  Frank- 
furter Zeitung,  admitted  that  the  same  phenomenon 
occurred  in  all  the  great  German  enveloping  opera- 
tions :  at  the  Marne,  in  Poland,  in  Serbia,  in  Rumania, 
and  at  Caporetto.  The  mouth  of  the  sack  in  which 
the  enemy  was  caught  never  was  closed.  Nor  could 
this  writer  find  any  convincing  explanation  of  German 
failure  to  realize  the  Cannae  conception.  He  could 
only  advance  the  excuses  of  inadequate  transport  and 
congestion  of  communications. 

This  exculpation  has  received  the  stamp  of  high 
German  official  authority.  For  Lieutenant-General 
Baron  Freytag-Loringhoven  engagingly  puts  forth 
something  very  like  it  when  he  says  in  his  Deductions 
from  the  World  War: 

It  was  proved  on  the  Marne  that  the  age  of  armies 
numbering  millions,  with  their  improved  armament 
and  the  widely  extended  fronts  which  they  necessitate, 
engenders  very  special  conditions.  On  the  Vistula 
and  in  Galicia  in  October,  191 4,  at  Lodz  and  after 
the  winter  battle  at  the  Masurian  Lakes,  as  well  as 
in  the  autumn  of  191 5  at  Vilna,  the  same  phenomena 


The  Creation  of  Mittel-Europa     213 

always  made  their  appearance,  even  though  the 
conditions  of  extent  and  character  of  the  ground, 
as  well  as  the  main  course  of  events,  were  in  each 
case  completely  different.  Forces  which  suffice  to 
achieve  victory  and  even  to  destroy  strong  sections 
of  the  enemy's  forces  prove  inadequate  for  the 
attainment  of  the  complete  success  which  is  desired. 

But  this  was  not  the  case  with  the  Allies  in  Palestine 
or  in  Macedonia  in  191 8,  or  with  Foch's  final  offensive. 
In  the  first  two  "complete  success"  was  attained.  In 
the  last  it  was  on  the  point  of  attainment  when  Luden- 
dorff  asked  for  an  armistice. 

General  Hoffmann,  one  of  the  ablest  of  Hindenburg's 
lieutenants,  has  attributed  the  comparative  failure  of 
the  Eastern  campaign  of  191 5  to  Falkenhayn's  poor 
judgment  in  not  directing  his  main  attack  against 
Kovno,  instead  of  Warsaw.  Kovno  was  the  key  to  the 
Russian  northern  front.  Had  it  fallen  first,  Hoffmann 
holds,  the  Russian  armies  exposed  in  the  Warsaw 
salient  and  in  Western  Galicia  would  have  been  en- 
veloped and  a  peace  of  surrender  would  have  been 
forced  on  Russia  by  the  end  of  191 5. 

But  here  again  the  factor  of  German  sluggishness 
enters.  Could  that  sluggishness  have  been  overcome 
any  more  successfully  by  an  offensive  in  the  north  than 
by  an  offensive  in  the  south?  German  progress  was 
impeded   by   an   over-dependence   on   heavy   artillery 


214    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

and  special  "shock  troop"  formations.  Armies  which 
use  1 2-inch  guns  in  the  field  must  be  slow  on  their 
feet.  And  this  fault  of  slowness  was  not  overcome 
by  the  German  commanders  even  as  late  as  191 8, 
when  the  warfare  of  positions  had  ended  and  semi-open 
warfare  had  returned. 

Germany  didn't  achieve  on  the  Russian  front  a  Sedan 
or  a  Sadowa.  She  didn't  gather  the  full  fruits  of  her 
military  superiority.  But  her  territorial  gains  enabled 
her  to  set  up  on  that  front  the  frame  work  of  a  Teuton 
Middle  Europe. 

On  the  Baltic  coast  the  Prussian  frontiers  had  been 
extended  to  the  Gulf  of  Riga.  Within  the  German 
lines,  south  from  the  Gulf  of  Riga  to  the  border  of 
Galicia,  were  included  the  province  of  Courland,  the  gov- 
ernments of  Kovno,  Grodno,  and  Vilna,  all  of  Poland, 
and  a  part  of  Volhynia.  The  area  of  the  territory  over- 
run exceeded  one  hundred  thousand  square  miles.  Its 
population  was  in  excess  of  twenty  millions.  In  a  five 
months'  campaign  Germany  had  expanded  her  own 
area  nearly  a  half  and  added  nearly  a  third  to  her 
population. 

The  assimilation  of  these  districts  would  not  have 
presented  any  great  difficulties  to  a  conqueror  with 
any  moral  fitness  for  world  empire.  Even  Germany, 
harsh  and  antipathetic  as  her  methods  were  with  subject 


The  Creation  of  Mittel-Europa     215 

peoples,  might  have  reconciled  the  Courlanders,  Letts, 
Lithuanians,  Poles,  and  White  Russians  to  a  Prussian 
"goose  step"  regimen;  for  thev  had  been  accustomed 
to  nothing  materially  better.  Courland's  aristocracy 
and  merchant  class  were  to  a  large  extent  German  in 
blood  and  sympathy.  The  Letts  and  Lithuanians, 
eager  for  racial  and  cultural  recognition  and  dis- 
gusted with  Russian  repression,  were  likely  to  wel- 
come even  a  shadowy  autonomy  under  a  German 
sovereign. 

The  Poles  had  no  illusions  about  the  blessings  of 
Prussian  rule.  They  hated  the  Prussians  even  more 
than  they  hated  the  Russians.  They  still  dreamed  of 
a  revival  of  the  glories  of  the  ancient  Polish  kingdom. 
But  if  real  political  independence  was  out  of  the  ques- 
tion for  them,  they  would  probably  have  given  a  passive 
assent  to  the  creation  of  a  Polish  dependency,  including 
Galicia,  under  a  Hapsburg  archduke.  While  Berlin 
wrangled  with  Vienna  over  this  reasonable  solution  che 
Poles  were  quiescent.  The  country  remained  tranquil 
under  a  three-year  German  occupation,  although  still 
hopeful  of  deliverance. 

After  October  I,  1915,  Germany's  only  preoccupa- 
tion on  che  Russian  front  was  to  organize  her  new  pos- 
sessions in  a  political  and  military  way.  Opportunity 
now  called  her  armies  to  the  south,  where  Mittel-Europa 


2i 6    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

was  to  be  rounded  out  and  an  Asian  attachment  added 
to  it. 

On  this  front,  too,  Austria-Hungary  needed  to  be 
safeguarded.  She  had  failed  disastrously  in  two  efforts 
to  conquer  Serbia.  With  Italy  attacking  her  on  the 
Isonzo,  her  flank  on  the  Danube  had  to  be  protected 
from  a  possible  Allied  offensive  out  of  the  Balkans. 

In  the  spring  of  191 5  Germany  was  forced  to  look 
on  helplessly  while  the  Allied  fleets  tried  to  rush  the 
Dardanelles.  The  Turks  were  left  to  work  out  their 
own  salvation  on  the  Gallipoli  peninsula. 

But  in  the  Balkans  that  year  all  the  breaks  of  the 
game  were  with  Germany.  The  Allied  attempt  to 
reach  Constantinople  ended  in  humiliation  and  dis- 
aster. Bungling  diplomacy  completed  the  wreck  of 
Allied  hopes.  Greece  was  lost  to  the  Entente  by 
Constantine's  betrayal  of  his  people.  The  crafty 
Ferdinand  of  Bulgaria  duped  the  Allied  governments 
and  secretly  came  to  terms  with  Berlin.  Serbia  was 
left  deserted  and  isolated.  Rumania,  not  ready  to 
fight,  had  relapsed  into  strict  neutrality.  The  stage 
had  set  itself  for  a  Teuton  offensive  in  the  Balkans 
which  would  clear  the  peninsula  and  link  up  an  ac- 
complished Teuton  Middle  Europe  with  an  inchoate 
Teuton  Middle  Asia. 

Mackensen,    with    his    12-inch    field    guns    and   his 


The  Creation  of  Mittel-Europa     217 

elite  "phalanx"  troops,  arrived  on  the  Danube  about 
the  middle  of  September.  Bulgaria  mobilized  on  Sep- 
tember 23d,  although  still  protesting  neutrality.  The 
Serbs  wanted  to  attack  Bulgaria  at  once,  but  were 
withheld  by  Delcasse  and  Sir  Edward  Grey.  On  Oc- 
tober 2d  Ferdinand  threw  off  the  mask  and  announced 
his  adhesion  to  the  Teuton  alliance. 

Serbia's  situation  was  tragic.  She  had  now  to  face 
a  German-Austro-Hungarian  attack  from  the  north 
and  a  Bulgarian  attack  from  the  east.  Her  armies 
were  second  to  none  in  fighting  quality.  But  they 
were  much  too  weak  in  numbers  to  stop  the  invaders. 
Nor  was  there  any  hope  of  Allied  aid  reaching  them 
in  time.  Greece  had  a  treaty  with  Serbia  binding  her 
to  go  to  the  latter's  assistance  against  Bulgaria.  Ve- 
nizelos  tried  to  live  up  to  it.  He  mobilized  the  Greek 
army  and  invited  the  Allies  to  send  troops  to  Salonica. 
But  Constantine  repudiated  the  treaty,  forced  Venizelos 
out  of  office,  and  then  protested  against  an  Allied  use 
of  Salonica  as  a  base  for  relief  operations.  The  French 
and  British  did  get  about  125,000  troops  into  Grecian 
Macedonia.  But  they  advanced  up  the  Vardar  Valley 
too  slowly  to  prevent  the  Bulgarians  breaking  through 
from  the  east  and  cutting  the  single  railroad  connecting 
Salonica  with  Middle  and  Northern  Serbia. 

While  the  Bulgarians  interposed  between  the  Serbians 


2i8    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

in  the  north  and  Sarrail's  forces,  which  were  seeking 
to  extricate  them,  Mackensen  conducted  a  leisurely 
advance  south  from  Belgrade.  His  objective  was 
Nish,  where  the  Vienna-Constantinople  trunk  line 
branches  off  to  Sofia.  Using  his  heavy  guns  and 
sparing  his  infantry,  he  gradually  pushed  the  main 
Serbian  army  to  the  south-west,  compelling  it  to  retreat 
through  the  Albanian  mountains  to  the  Adriatic.  In 
less  than  two  months  Serbia  was  a  memory.  The 
government  was  in  exile.  The  troops  who  survived 
the  ordeal  of  the  Albanian  retreat  were  taken  to  Corfu 
to  recuperate  and  many  months  later  were  transferred 
to  the  Salonica  front. 

The  British  and  French  forces  which  had  pushed  up 
the  Vardar  Valley  found  themselves  in  peril  and  re- 
treated into  Greece,  where  Sarrail  spent  the  winter 
constructing  the  entrenched  camp  north  of  Salonica. 
Here  an  Allied  army  of  from  200,000  to  500,000  was  tied 
up  for  nearly  three  years,  clinging  to  the  only  foothold 
left  to  the  Allies  in  the  Balkan  Peninsula.  All  the 
rest  of  it  save  Rumania  (now  as  much  cut  off  as  Russia) 
and  Greece  (whose  court  and  government  were  pro- 
German)  had  been  incorporated  in  the  Teuton  Empire, 
stretching  uninterruptedly  from  the  Baltic  to  the 
lower  reaches  of  the  Tigris. 

Such  was  the  astounding   German   achievement  of 


The  Creation  of  Mittel-Europa     219 

191 5.  By  alliance  and  conquest  the  essentials  of  the 
Pan-German  dream  had  been  realized.  Germany's 
European  position  had  been  secured.  And  the  way 
was  also  paved  to  the  establishment  of  a  German  Asian 
empire  rivalling  Russia's  or  Great  Britain's. 

Speaking  broadly,  the  ends  of  a  moderate  and  rational 
German  military  policy  had  now  been  attained.  The 
Teuton  state  called  into  being  at  the  end  of  191 5  was 
one  which  needed  no  sea  power  and  no  overseas  colo- 
nies. It  could  not  be  strangled  by  hostile  sea  power. 
It  took  intelligent  account  of  the  advantages  and  the 
limitations  of  Germany's  geographical  position.  It 
could  be  maintained  by  land  power  alone.  And  Ger- 
man land  power  was  ample  to  maintain  it.  It  could 
also  be  defended  and  enlarged  at  slight  cost,  because 
of  Germany's  vast  superiority  in  military  organization 
over  Russia,  her  sole  competitor  for  mastery  in  Eastern 
Europe  and  Central  Asia.  Germany  was  the  victor 
on  the  face  of  the  war  map.  All  she  needed  to  do  was 
to  hold  fast  to  what  she  had  won. 

But  the  original  confusions  of  German  military  policy 
persisted.  The  illusions  of  grandeur,  of  world  power, 
of  naval  supremacy,  of  overseas  colonies,  which  the 
Germany  of  William  II  cherished,  obscured  the  vision 
of  boch  statesmen  and  soldiers.  Hindenburg  came 
closest  to  grasping  the  realities  of  the  military  situa- 


220    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

tion.  But  he  was  not  yet  in  power  in  January,  1916, 
and  by  the  time  he  came  into  power  Ludendorff  had 
assumed  the  right  to  speak  for  him. 

Falkenhayn,  still  chief -of -staff,  took  the  superficial 
view  that  having  cleared  and  stabilized  the  Eastern 
Front  he  could  afford  to  resume  the  offensive  in  the 
West.  He  was  confident  of  repeating  at  the  expense 
of  France  the  easy  Russian  and  Balkan  triumphs  of 
191 5.  Hence  the  futile  and  wasteful  experiment  at 
Verdun,  where  Germany  incurred  ten  times  the  losses 
which  the  capture  of  Riga  would  have  involved  and 
probably  two  or  three  times  the  losses  which  would  have 
been  incurred  in  breaking  the  entire  Russian  northern 
front  and  capturing  Petrograd.  And  had  the  Germans 
entered  Petrograd  in  191 6,  Russia  might  have  been 
put  out  of  the  war  a  year  earlier,  either  by  surrender 
or  revolution,  and  the  military  situation  of  the  En- 
tente would  have  become  desperate.  Destiny  had 
other  plans,  however,  which  were  to  be  fulfilled  through 
the  arrogance  and  wrong-headedness  of  German 
leadership. 


CHAPTER  XII 

JOFFRE'S    "NIBBLING" — THE    DEVELOPMENT   OF 
POSITIONAL   WARFARE 

From  January,  1915,  to  the  end  of  February,  1916, 
Germany  renounced  the  offensive  on  the  Western 
Front.  She  was  content  to  hold  fast  there  while  her 
armies  in  the  east  were  crushing  Russia  and  Serbia 
and  hewing  out  the  boundaries  of  the  new  Teuton 
Central  European  and  West  Asian  state. 

There  were  only  two  departures  (both  nominal)  from 
the  German  policy  of  defence.  In  January,  Kluck 
attacked  and  roughly  handled  a  couple  of  French 
divisions  which  had  crossed  the  Aisne  River  north  of 
Soissons  and  whose  communications  had  been  imperilled 
by  a  flood.  In  April  came  the  second  German  drive 
for  Ypres.  This  succeeded  far  beyond  German  expec- 
tations. It  was  intended  only  as  a  demonstration, 
and  when,  through  the  use,  for  the  first  time,  of  chlorine 
gas  waves,  a  French  colonial  division  north-east  of 
Ypres  was  stampeded,  leaving  a  big  gap  in  the  Allied 
line,  the  Germans  had  no  reserves  at  hand  to  exploit 


222    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

the  victory.  Here  the  obstinate  valour  of  the  Cana- 
dian troops,  whose  left  flank  was  uncovered  by  the 
flight  of  the  Colonials,  prevented  a  disaster  and  saved 
Ypres.  But  the  Allies  had  to  yield  practically  all 
of  the  ridges  east  of  the  city,  to  retake  which  in 
191 7  cost  the  British  army  a  long  and  bloody  summer 
campaign. 

These  two  interruptions  apart,  the  offensive  in  the 
West  remained  for  fourteen  months  in  the  hands  of 
the  Allies.  The  Allied  staffs  had  every  opportunity 
to  try  out  the  German  defence  and  to  develop  an  ade- 
quate counter-blow  to  Germany's  attack  on  Russia. 
But  no  such  counter-blow  was  developed.  Entente 
strategy  remained  through  all  this  period  tentative, 
unformed,  and  rudimentary.  It  embodied  no  more 
formidable  conception  than  that  plan  of  scattering, 
experimental  attacks  which  received  the  somewhat 
derisory  name  of  "nibbling."  To  paraphrase  the  fa- 
miliar saying  that  Nero  fiddled  while  Rome  burned, 
while  Russian  military  power  was  being  shattered  in 
Galicia  and  Poland,  the  French  and  British  on  the  West 
Front  "nibbled." 

This  policy  was  in  part  compulsory,  dictated  by  the 
cramped  position  in  which  the  French  found  themselves 
after  the  Marne  and  Flanders  campaigns.  Joffre's 
enforced  "nibbling"  in  191 5  was  the  direct  outcome 


Joffre's  "Nibbling"  223 

of  the  mistakes  in  strategy  in  19 14,  which  had  left 
so  large  an  area  in  Northern  France  in  the  possession 
of  the  Germans.  The  natural  preoccupation  of  the 
French  was  to  defend  their  own  soil  and  to  recover 
their  lost  departments. 

But  the  psychological  effect  of  this  preoccupation  was 
to  narrow  the  strategical  outlook  of  the  French  High 
Command  and  to  make  it  distrustful  of  any  ventures 
whatever,  which  might  reduce  Allied  strength  in  the 
West.  It  undoubtedly  felt  a  sense  of  relief  when  the 
Germans  carried  their  offensive  to  the  East.  But  it 
didn't  grasp  at  once  the  real  meaning  of  the  German 
eastern  attack  or  realize  that  the  true  counter-irritant 
to  it  was  not  a  succession  of  local  offensives  on  the 
West  Front,  but  an  attack  on  Constantinople.  The 
critical  theatre  of  war  for  the  Allies  in  191 5  was  Gal- 
lipoli  and  the  Balkans.  France  awoke  to  that  situa- 
tion too  late — even  later  than  Great  Britain  did.  In 
September,  when  the  chance  to  take  Constantinople  had 
passed  and  Serbia  was  beyond  rescue,  the  French  sent 
to  Salonica  more  than  enough  divisions  to  have  seized 
Bulair,  the  neck  of  the  Gallipoli  peninsula,  and  cut 
off  the  Turkish  armies  defending  the  forts  at  the 
Dardanelles  Narrows. 

The  French,  moreover,  were  not  in  a  state  of  mind 
early   in    191 5   to   credit    Germany    with    a    complete 


224    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

cessation  of  offensive  operations  on  the  Western 
Front.  They  believed  that  the  Germans  would  turn 
back  from  the  East  sooner  or  later — that  their  real 
objective  was  Paris,  not  Moscow  or  Petrograd.  And 
that  assumption  was  verified  a  year  later  at  Verdun. 

For  a  year  to  come,  possibly  for  two  years,  the  French 
knew  that  they  would  have  to  bear  the  brunt  of  any 
German  attacks  on  the  West.  Great  Britain  was 
slowly  getting  ready  to  make  war.  Kitchener's  Three 
Million  Volunteers  were  just  beginning  to  assemble. 
They  could  not  be  expected  to  appear  in  the  fighting 
line  until  191 6.  Kitchener  had  himself  intimated  that 
Great  Britain's  strength  would  not  be  fully  developed 
until  191 7.  To  the  French  mind  the  military  problem 
therefore  presented  itself  as  a  fight  for  time — a  cautious 
bridging  over  of  the  interval  in  which  the  British 
forces  were  being  equipped  and  trained. 

But  there  was  a  fallacy  in  this  view — the  same 
fallacy  which  underlay  the  theory  that  the  Allies 
could  win  the  war  through  mere  attrition.  The 
Entente  Powers,  after  Italy  joined  them,  had  a  more 
than  two-to-one  superiority  in  crude  man-power. 
They  could  wear  the  Teuton  Powers  down,  if  attrition 
worked  steadily  and  blindly.  But  it  couldn't  work 
that  way.  Time  fought  for  the  Entente  so  far  as  the 
utilization  of  British  man-power  was  concerned.     But 


Joffre's  "Nibbling"  225 

it  fought  against  the  Entente  so  far  as  the  utilization 
of  Russia's  vastly  greater  man-power  was  concerned. 

The  great  stake  in  the  191 5  campaigns  was  Russia. 
And  a  strict  defence  on  the  Western  Front,  with  occa- 
sional "nibbling"  offensives,  which  produced  almost 
negligible  results  on  small  sectors  of  that  front,  could 
do  nothing  to  save  Russia  to  the  Entente.  Once 
Germany,  at  a  very  moderate  cost,  had  eliminated 
Russia,  with  her  population  of  170,000,000,  the  Allied 
preponderance  in  crude  man-power  would  disappear. 
Attrition  would  become  a  sword  cutting  both  ways.  A 
wary  fight  for  time  would  avail  nothing;  tor,  thereafter, 
the  Entente  would  be  fighting  against  time,  and  not 
Germany. 

In  1915,  after  Italy  entered  the  war,  the  Allies  had 
probably  a  relatively  greater  superiority  over  the  Ger- 
mans on  the  West  Front  than  at  any  other  period  up 
to  the  time  when  the  American  reinforcement  became 
available.  But  a  confused  perception  of  the  aims  of 
German  strategy  and  the  lack  of  unified  command 
prevented  any  advantageous  use  of  that  superiority. 
Italy  had  more  troops  than  could  be  employed  at  once 
on  the  Trieste-Trentino  front.  And,  as  events  were  to 
prove,  the  Italian  attempt  to  break  through  the  Aus- 
trian mountain  barrier  was  always  a  hopeless  under- 
taking.    France  and  Great  Britain  lost  together  about 


226    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

two  hundred  thousand  men  in  the  "nibbling"  opera- 
tions of  1 91 5  in  Flanders,  Artois,  and  Champagne.  And 
these  troops,  with  Italy's  overplus,  if  dispatched  to 
Gallipoli,  would  probably  have  been  able  to  cut  a  way 
to  Constantinople,  thus  rescuing  Russia  and  Serbia. 

When,  in  the  fall  of  1863,  Lee,  having  the  benefit 
of  interior  lines,  transferred  Longstreet's  corps  to 
Bragg  at  Chickamauga,  Meade  countered  by  sending 
two  corps  to  reinforce  the  Army  of  the  Cumberland.  In 
a  similar  exigency  no  troops  were  withdrawn  from  the 
Allied  Western  Front  to  support  the  Gallipoli  expedi- 
tion. Seven  divisions  or  more  were  sent  to  the  ^gean 
from  England  and  the  Allied  strategists  of  the  Western 
school  never  ceased  to  complain  that  they  were  not 
used  instead  of  France  in  operations  like  that  at  Neuve 
Chapelle  and  Loos,  which  could  produce  only  local 
and  negligible  results  at  a  pathetically  disproportionate 
cost. 

The  1 91 5  "nibbles"  on  the  West  Front  strikingly 
disclosed  the  poverty  of  Entente  strategy.  But  they 
were  possibly  an  unavoidable  phase  in  the  education 
of  armies  suddenly  called  upon  to  face  the  problems 
of  grand  scale  trench  warfare.  War  had  taken  a  new 
turn,  which  the  General  Staffs  had  not  foreseen.  Its 
difficulties  had  to  be  understood  before  they  could  be 
mastered.      The   Germans   solved   them  in   the   East 


Joffre's  "Nibbling"  227 

with  astonishing  ease,  because  German  technical  and 
mechanical  superiority  on  that  front  was  overwhelming. 
In  the  West,  where  that  superiority  was  less  marked 
in  the  beginning  and  steadily  dwindled,  neither  side 
solved  them  until  near  the  close  of  the  war. 

Neuve  Chapelle  was  the  first  Allied  effort  to  break 
through  an  enemy  trench  system.  This  village  lies 
about  five  miles  north-west  of  La  Bassee,  in  French 
Flanders,  and  about  twelve  miles  west  of  Lille.  The 
purpose  of  the  attack  was  to  open  the  road  to  Lille, 
which  was  the  chief  German  base  in  this  region. 

The  British  introduced  here  the  principle  of  massed 
artillery  fire,  sufficient  in  intensity  to  destroy  the  shal- 
low trenches  of  that  day,  and  raze  all  the  barbed-wire 
entanglements  in  front  of  them.  The  bombardment 
on  the  morning  of  March  10,  191 5,  was  completely 
successful  on  a  narrow  front  opposite  Neuve  Chapelle. 
But  farther  north  the  obstructions  were  not  destroyed. 
The  British  troops  in  that  section  of  the  battlefield 
were  held  up,  and  thrown  into  confusion.  Only  a  small 
wedge  had  been  driven  into  the  German  line.  There 
was  a  delay  of  four  hours  and  a  half  in  the  attempt 
to  widen  it  out.  On  the  northern  face,  toward  Aubers, 
the  Germans  had  ample  time  to  rally  and  the  original 
opening  was  soon  closed  up. 

By  the  evening  of  March  10th  the   operation    had 


228    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

definitely  failed,  although  fighting  continued  through 
March  nth.  The  British  casualties  were  12,811 — 
about  one  fourth  of  the  forces  engaged.  Nothing  had 
been  gained  except  the  knowledge  that  heavy  artillery 
could  blast  away  the  front  lines  of  a  trench  system, 
but  that  extreme  precision  in  the  follow-up  infantry 
movement  was  needed  to  carry  the  attack  through. 

In  May  the  French  began  an  offensive  south-west  of 
Lens,  with  that  important  coal-mining  and  railroad 
centre  as  its  objective.  The  British  had  a  small  part 
in  this,  attacking  east  of  Festubert  and  losing  eight 
thousand  men  in  a  few  hours  because  of  deficient 
artillery  preparation.  The  French  operation  was  in 
the  hands  of  Foch.  That  was  ample  guarantee  that 
everything  was  done  which  could  have  been  done  to 
insure  a  fair  test  of  the  value  of  the  "nibbling"  process. 
The  fighting  lasted  from  May  8th  until  early  in  June 
and  goes  under  the  general  name  of  the  Battle  of  Artois. 

Foch  made  considerable  progress  at  first.  He  cap- 
tured the  famous  Labyrinth,  a  German  trench  strong- 
hold just  south  of  Vimy  Ridge,  which  covered  Lens 
from  the  south-west.  He  also  cleared  the  Notre  Dame 
de  Lorette  Ridge,  to  the  west  of  Lens.  But  if  he  ever 
had  any  large  strategic  purpose  in  view — that,  for 
instance,  of  breaking  through  the  bulwarks  of  the 
German  line  above  Arras,  and  compelling  a  consider- 


Joffre's  "Nibbling"  229 

able  German  retirement — he  failed  utterly  in  attaining 
it.  He  succeeded  in  penetrating  the  German  line  on 
a  narrow  front.  But  this  dent  could  neither  be  widened 
out  nor  deepened. 

The  French  discovered  again  that  positions  subjected 
to  a  "drum  fire"  bombardment  became  untenable. 
It  was  easy  for  the  infantry  to  advance  immediately 
after  the  artillery  assault  and  capture  prisoners  and 
guns.  But  the  existence  of  supporting  positions  on  the 
flank  and  in  the  rear  of  the  area  of  bombardment 
made  the  cost  of  expanding  an  initial  gain  almost 
prohibitive. 

The  French  never  imitated  on  a  great  scale  the 
German  example  of  creating  special  shock  troops  to 
follow  up  artillery  attacks.  In  the  long  run  this  was 
good  policy.  The  German  method  lowered  the  quality 
of  the  ordinary  formations.  It  compelled  a  commander 
to  depend  more  and  more  on  a  small  percentage  of  his 
fighting  force.  Acting  on  the  offensive  he  could,  per- 
haps, afford  to  do  this,  holding  the  ordinary  battalions 
as  reserves  and  supports.  But  when  the  Germans 
were  thrown  on  the  defensive,  after  July  18,  191 8, 
the  dangers  of  the  system  became  patent.  There  were 
not  enough  elite  formations  to  go  around  and  the  bur- 
den of  meeting  the  Allied  offensive  fell  in  many  in- 
stances on  organizations  whose  morale  and  efficiency 


230    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

had  been  greatly  impaired  by  the  weeding  out  of  their 
shock  material.  It  was  an  Allied  army  of  even  quality 
which  defeated  a  German  army  of  uneven  quality  in 
the  final  battles  of  191 8. 

The  failure  at  Neuve  Chapelle  uncovered  the  fact 
that  the  British  army  was  poorly  supplied  with  muni- 
tions for  the  heavy  guns  and  lacked  the  high  explosive 
shells  needed  to  destroy  field  trenches  of  the  more 
elaborate  kind.  The  War  Office  had  been  sending 
shrapnel  to  the  front.  But  shrapnel  was  now  almost 
as  useless  in  preparing  an  infantry  attack  against  field 
positions  as  machine  gun  or  rifle  fire  was.  The  Allies 
had  greatly  underrated  the  stiffness  of  the  German 
intrenched  defence.  Mackensen  might  smother  the 
relatively  weak  enemy  lines  in  Galicia  and  Poland  with 
his  monster  guns  and  high  explosives.  The  Allies 
lacked  these  essentials  of  the  new  mode  of  warfare. 
And  they  were  confronted  by  an  enemy  much  more 
advanced  in  the  technique  of  trench  fighting  than  they 
were. 

All  through  the  summer  the  French  and  British 
worked  feverishly  building  heavy  field  guns,  manufac- 
turing high  explosive  shells  and  trench  bombs,  mul- 
tiplying their  machine-gun  equipment,  turning  out 
trench  helmets  and  masks,  and  otherwise  catching  up 
with  the  requirements  of  the  warfare  of  fixed  positions. 


Joffre's  "Nibbling"  231 

In  the  fall  they  were  ready  to  "nibble"  again.  Two 
simultaneous  offensives  were  planned  for  the  last  week 
of  September.  The  first,  in  Artois,  under  Foch  and 
Sir  John  French,  aimed  at  Lens,  which  was  to  be  en- 
veloped by  the  capture  of  Vimy  Ridge,  on  the  south, 
and  the  cutting  of  the  Lens-La  Bassee  highroad,  on 
the  north.  The  second,  in  Champagne,  under  Petain, 
had  as  its  objective,  Vouziers,  the  chief  German  rail- 
road base  in  the  "Dusty"  Champagne  region.  Both 
these  attempts  were  made  with  large  armies,  well 
supplied  with  artillery.  If  both  had  succeeded  the 
German  armies  in  the  great  salient  with  its  apex  at 
Noyon  would  have  been  put  in  peril  and  a  broad  German 
retirement  would  have  become  necessary. 

The  Champagne  operation  was  the  principal  one. 
It  was  preceded  by  the  heaviest  "drum  fire"  of  the 
war  up  to  that  date.  The  first  German  line  was  de- 
molished. The  French  infantry  cleared  it  with  trifling 
losses,  making  large  captures  in  guns  and  prisoners. 
But  beyond  the  first  trench  line  was  a  second,  which 
the  infantry,  unsupported  by  "drum  fire,"  couldn't 
clear.  As  so  often  happened  in  this  early  phase  of 
rigid  positional  warfare,  many  of  the  units  which 
penetrated  the  second  line  never  came  back.  They 
were  cut  off  or  annihilated.  Delay  in  bringing  forward 
the  artillery  allowed  enemy  reserves  to  pour  in.     In 


232    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

the  second  stage  of  the  operation  the  assailants  suffered 
enormous  losses. 

The  Champagne  offensive  lasted  from  September 
25th  until  October  2d.  Then  it  was  abandoned. 
Petain  had  advanced  about  a  mile  and  a  half  on  a  front 
of  about  fifteen  miles.  He  had  taken  twenty-five 
thousand  prisoners  and  150  guns.  But  he  had  hardly- 
gotten  a  start  toward  Vouziers.  He  hadn't  even  cut 
the  little  auxiliary  railroad  in  the  German  rear,  which 
ran  through  Somme-Py.  He  lost  something  like 
120,000  men.  The  German  loss  was  probably  no  greater. 
Strategically  the  effect  of  this  costly  offensive  was  nil. 
It  didn't  shake  the  Germans  out  of  the  Noyon  salient. 
It  contributed  little  or  nothing  toward  a  solution  of 
the  problem  of  trench  war  deadlock. 

In  Artois  the  Champagne  experience  was  duplicated. 
Foch,  advancing  north-east  toward  Lens,  on  Septem- 
ber 25th,  took  Souchez  and  pushed  toward  the  summit 
of  Vimy  Ridge.  But  he  was  unable  to  clear  the  ridge 
and  in  a  few  days  was  obliged  to  drop  his  offensive 
and  go  to  the  aid  of  the  British,  who  were  hard  pressed 
to  the  north  of  Lens.  The  British  attack  had  opened 
brilliantly.  The  formidable  Hohenzollern  redoubt,  cov- 
ering the  Lens-La  Bassee  road,  was  taken  by  assault 
and  the  road  itself  was  crossed  at  Hulluch.  Farther 
south  the  British  took  Loos  and  Hill  70,  penetrating 


Joffre's  "Nibbling"  233 

the  last  German  trench  line.  Lens  was  in  great  danger 
of  envelopment  from  the  north. 

But,  as  at  Neuve  Chapelle,  the  organization  of  the 
attack  broke  down.  The  Scottish  troops  who  had 
passed  beyond  Loos  were  not  supported.  They  suffered 
severely  and  were  pushed  back.  By  September  27th 
the  Germans  were  back  in  their  original  lines  north 
of  Lens.  The  British  losses  in  the  Loos  offensive  were 
estimated  at  sixty  thousand.  Only  three  thousand 
prisoners  and  twenty-five  guns  were  taken  in  the  first 
phase  of  the  assault.  The  Loos  disaster  caused  the  re- 
tirement of  Sir  John  French  as  British  commander-in- 
chief.  But  the  failure  was  not  essentially  his.  It  was 
the  natural  failure  of  an  insufficiently  trained  army  to 
master  the  enormous  technical  difficulties  of  offensive 
trench  warfare. 

The  Germans  had  surmounted  these  difficulties  in 
their  demonstration  against  Ypres.  But  they  wisely 
refrained  in  191 5  from  risking  any  serious  offensives 
in  the  West.  The  trench  defence  on  that  front  was 
still  too  strong  to  be  broken.  It  was  sound  policy 
on  the  part  of  the  Germans  to  let  the  Allies  assume 
the  burden  of  experimentation.  And  the  Allies  in 
1 91 5  still  lacked  the  power  to  do  anything  but  "nibble." 

Trench  warfare  involved,  apparently,  an  abandon- 
ment of  all  the  technique  of  modern  military  science. 


234    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

It  was  a  reversion  to  primitive  methods  of  combat — 
to  fighting  at  close  quarters  with  hand  grenades,  bay- 
onets, and  knives,  to  the  siege  tactics  of  the  ancients. 
The  front  trench  lines  ran  within  speaking  distance 
of  each  other.  The  zone  of  fire,  which  had  been 
enlarged  by  modern  weapons  to  miles,  was  suddenly 
contracted  again  to  yards.  Contact  between  the 
opposing  forces  was  continuous  and  fire  of  some  sort 
was  incessant.  All  the  disused  arts  of  destruction 
at  short  range  were  revived. 

But  the  resemblance  to  aboriginal  warfare  was  super- 
ficial and  misleading.  An  enormous  development  in 
the  rapidity  of  small  arms  fire,  through  the  invention 
of  the  machine  gun,  and  in  the  power  of  artillery  had 
driven  the  infantry  under  the  ground.  But  military 
science  had  not  bankrupted  itself.  It  had  not  become 
stagnant.  It  had  destroyed  open  warfare,  with  all 
its  minutiae  of  technique,  in  order  to  create  a  barren 
trench  warfare  deadlock.  Now  its  mission  was  to 
overcome  the  inertia  of  the  rigid  warfare  of  positions 
by  destroying  the  value  of  the  trench.  Artillery  had 
brought  the  underground  trench  fortress  into  being. 
It  had  now  to  undo  its  work  by  making  the  underground 
fortress  as  vulnerable  as  it  had  made  the  fortress  above 
ground. 

The  trench  system — especially  the  deep  permanent 


Joffre's  "Nibbling"  235 

trench  system  of  191 5  and  191 6 — gave  the  defensive 
a  relative  advantage  over  the  offensive  such  as  it  had 
seldom  before  possessed.  But  since  it  is  in  the  nature 
of  war  that  the  offensive  shall  eventually  outstrip  the 
defensive,  that  superiority  could  not  last.  The  tussle 
between  the  resisting  power  of  the  massive  dugout 
and  the  destructive  power  of  artillery  continued  for 
nearly  two  years.  Then  the  dugout  was  converted 
into  a  trap,  as  land  fortresses,  like  Liege,  Namur, 
Antwerp,  and  Przemysl,  had  been.  When  this  was 
accomplished  a  return  to  something  like  the  old  condi- 
tions of  the  warfare  of  movement  was  close  at  hand. 

Early  in  191 5  the  trench  systems  were  comparatively 
simple  in  construction  and  shallow  in  depth.  Lieu- 
tenant-Colonel Paul  Azan,  of  the  French  army,  who 
fought  in  Flanders  and  at  the  Labyrinth,  south-west 
of  Lens,  and  came  to  the  United  States  later,  as  a 
military  instructor,  described  the  earlier  system  in  his 
book  The  Warfare  of  Today.  He  enumerates  among 
the  elements  of  a  position: 

1.  A  first  line  trench,  which  is  continuous,  pre- 
ceded by  listening  posts  and  protected  by  accessory 
defences. 

2.  A  doubling  trench  (sometimes  miscalled  a 
"cover  trench")  fifty  to  one  hundred  yards  behind 
the  first  line  trench. 

3.  Transversal  trenches,  varying  in  number. 


236    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

4.  A  support-trench,  five  hundred  to  eight  hun- 
dred yards  behind  the  first  line  trench. 

5.  A  line  of  redoubts  (sometimes  miscalled 
"reserve  trenches")  not  continuous,  which  is  often 
used  both  to  stop  the  enemy's  advance  and  to  protect 
important  groups  of  artillery. 

6.  Boyaux,  running  from  the  rear  up  to  the  first 
line  trench  and  serving  for  communicating  between 
the  various  trenches,  which  are,  with  the  possible 
exception  of  the  transversal  ones,  roughly  parallel 
to  one  another. 

"Thus,"  Colonel  Azan  adds,  "a  subterranean  city  is 
dug  out  little  by  little,  echeloned  in  depth,  and  con- 
tinually improved  in  point  of  comfort  and  security." 

There  were  few  comforts  at  first — and  seldom  any 
in  unfortunate  regions,  like  Flanders,  where  the  sub- 
soil is  always  water-soaked.  But  as  these  underground 
communities  grew  and  burrowed  deeper  into  the  earth 
concrete  and  lumber  were  used  in  increasing  qualities 
and  living  conditions  were  vastly  bettered.  Floors 
were  laid  in  the  dugouts,  electric  lighting  was  in- 
stalled, and  in  many  cases  there  were  luxuries  like 
bathing  facilities,  household  furniture,  and  pianos. 

The  relatively  shallow  trench  systems  of  19 15  and 
191 6  were  strongly  held.  On  both  sides  defensive  tac- 
tics were  the  same.  The  idea  was  to  prevent  a  breach 
in  the  line  at  almost  any  cost.  Troops  sufficient  to 
counter-attack  and  recover  a  lost  first  trench  line  were 


Joffre's  "Nibbling"  237 

always  close  at  hand.  For  that  reason  even  the  grand 
scale  Allied  offensives  in  Artois  and  Champagne  pro- 
duced only  an  immaterial  territorial  gain.  Nor  would 
the  German  second  attack  on  Ypres  have  re-won  the 
heights  north-east  of  that  city,  except  that  the  Allied 
defence  was  paralyzed  for  a  time  by  the  terrifying 
effects  of  the  German  chlorine  gas. 

Rigidity  in  defence  became  a  fetish.  It  looked,  for 
a  time,  as  if  the  war  would  have  to  be  fought  to  a  finish 
of  exhaustion  on  the  long  line  from  the  North  Sea  to 
Switzerland  on  which  the  opposing  armies  had  dug  in. 

But  this  ideal  of  rigidity  gradually  defeated  itself. 
While  the  trench  systems  were  becoming  more  elaborate 
and  more  permanent  in  character,  the  scope  and  power 
of  the  artillery  attack  were  increasing  by  leaps  and 
bounds.  Under  long-continued  "drumfire"  the  front 
line  garrisons  were  obliged  to  hide  in  the  depths  of  the 
dugouts.  When  the  infantry  advance  began  a  barrage 
was  laid  down  in  the  rear  of  the  defenders,  cutting 
off  their  retreat  and  preventing  supports  from  arriving. 
The  capture  by  the  French  in  Champagne  of  twenty- 
five  thousand  prisoners,  trapped  in  the  front  German 
trench  system,  was  the  first  hint  of  the  peril  of  holding 
a  shallow  line  too  rigidly  and  with  large  masses  of 
troops. 

The  initial  losses  of  the  French  at  Verdun  and  of 


238    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

the  Germans  on  the  Somme  reinforced  this  lesson. 
Thereafter  the  Germans,  who  were  to  remain  on  the 
defensive  on  the  West  all  through  191 7,  began  to  alter 
their  positional  warfare  tactics.  Trench  systems  were 
deepened  enormously.  The  fixed  trench  line  of  191 5 
became  the  fixed  trench  zone  of  191 7.  The  centre  of 
resistance  was  shifted  toward  the  rear.  An  elastic 
frontal  system  was  organized,  the  backbone  of  which 
were  the  "pill  boxes" — concrete  outposts  fitted  up 
with  machine  guns  and  manned  by  small  garrisons. 
The  function  of  these  concealed  small  forts  was  to 
retard  an  enemy  advancing  after  the  artillery  prepara- 
tion ceased.  If  they  failed  to  stop  his  progress,  he 
would  soon  bring  up  against  the  main  defensive  posi- 
tions a  mile  or  two  miles  back,  where  he  would  be 
subject  to  counter-attack.  Under  this  defensive  scheme 
heavy  losses  in  the  forezone  were  avoided.  The  main 
action  took  place,  under  more  favourable  conditions 
for  the  defender,  in  the  middle,  or  battle  zone. 

The  zone  idea  reached  its  fullest  development  in 
the  construction  of  the  famous  Hindenburg  Line, 
wrongly  so-called.  It  was  not  a  fortified  line,  but  a 
fortified  belt.  It  is  instructive  to  compare  the  modest 
trench  system  of  191 5,  sketched  by  Lieutenant-Colonel 
Azan,  with  the  vast  underground  fortress,  guarding 
Douai,  Cambrai,  St.  Quentin,  and  La  Fere,  which  the 


Joffre's  "Nibbling"  239 

Germans  spent  nearly  two  years  in  building.  Lieu- 
tenant-General Baron  Ardenne,  one  of  the  most  promi- 
nent and  one  of  the  most  optimistic  of  German  military 
critics,  wrote  of  the  Hindenburg  barrier  in  September, 
1918: 

The  British  call  this  the  Hindenburg  Line,  thereby 
betraying  that  they  completely  mistake  its  real 
character.  It  is  not  a  line,  but  a  complicated, 
quadratic  system  of  tactical  bases  and  positions, 
reinforced  after  the  manner  of  a  fortification,  from 
Cambrai  to  La  Fere — that  is  to  say,  over  a  front  with 
a  width  of  sixty  kilometres  [about  thirty-eight  miles] 
and  a  depth  up  to  forty  kilometres  [twenty-five 
miles].  The  enemy,  therefore,  has  to  shatter  a 
granite  block  of  2400  square  kilometres  before  he 
would  be  in  a  position  freely  to  develop  his  forces 
and  steer  them  to  their  higher  goals,  for  overcoming 
the  Siegfried  position  and  its  collateral  positions  could 
only  form  the  introduction  to  further  developments 
which  would  cause  the  ultimate  aims  of  the  Entente 
Powers  to  retire  into  crepuscular  remoteness. 

Only  three  weeks  after  this  was  written  the  Hinden- 
burg Line  had  become  a  memory.  Six  weeks  after  it 
was  written  LudendorfT  was  clamouring  for  an  armistice 
as  the  only  means  of  avoiding  a  German  surrender. 

For  formidable  and  impregnable  as  it  seemed  to  be 
to  those  who  constructed  it,  the  Hindenburg  Zone 
was  from  the  beginning  an  acknowledgment  that  the 
offensive   was   gradually   mastering   the   defensive   on 


240    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

the  Western  Front.  The  turning  point  was  reached 
in  191 7,  when  one  Allied  offensive  after  another  demon- 
strated that  the  German  defence  lines  could  be  pierced 
to  a  considerable  extent  by  a  sufficiently  concentrated 
attack.  Cambrai,  in  November,  191 7,  showed  that 
an  attack  could  get  clear  through. 

If  it  had  been  conceded  that  it  was  fruitless  to  try 
to  hold  a  forefront  line  rigidly,  how  could  a  middle  line 
be  expected  to  hold,  merely  because  of  its  defensive 
strength?  The  arrival  of  the  tank  ended  the  value  of 
the  elastic  "pill  box"  front;  for  the  tanks  could  drive 
in  among  the  "pill  boxes"  and  silence  them.  Then 
the  midzone  of  defence  would  be  converted  into  the 
forezone,  and  another  midzone  would  have  to  be 
created  further  back,  out  of  the  field  of  the  artillery 
attack.  The  phase  of  fixed  positional  warfare  was 
therefore  passing  and  yielding  to  the  phase  of  rapidly 
shifting  positional  warfare.  The  warfare  of  movement 
was  replacing  the  deadlock  of  the  trenches. 

Within  three  years  and  a  half  war  had  again  modern- 
ized itself,  escaping  from  an  apparent  reversion  to 
immobility  and  stagnation.  After  191 5  rigid  positional 
warfare  was  to  continue  for  a  time.  But  its  paralysis 
was  being  lifted.  In  building  the  colossal  Hindenburg 
system  the  Germans  were  to  discover  eventually  that 
they  had  only  erected  a  monument  to  the  past. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

VERDUN 

"The  epic  of  Verdun."  This  French  phrase  will 
stick  because  of  its  felicity.  The  defence  of  the  ancient 
fortress  on  the  Meuse  was  Homeric  in  quality.  There 
France  met  the  rudest  test  of  the  war  with  epical 
devotion  and  fortitude. 

Germany,  near  the  peak  of  her  military  development, 
flushed  by  the  extraordinary  success  of  her  Eastern 
campaigns,  challenged  France  in  February,  1916,  to 
an  ordeal  of  endurance.  It  was  to  be  a  sheer  competi- 
tion in  staying  power,  both  physical  and  moral.  Hin- 
denburg  had  said  that  the  Russians  were  not  equal  to 
a  contest  in  which  victory  would  go  to  the  belligerent 
with  "the  stronger  nerves."  His  theory  had  justified 
itself  in  the  East.  The  Germans  now  sought  to  experi- 
ment with  it  in  the  West. 

The  campaign  for  Verdun  involved  no  subtleties  of 

strategy.     Falkenhayn  set  out  to  eject  the  French  by 

brute  force  from  one  of  the  strongest  positions  they 

held  between  the  Swiss  border  and  Arras.     And  the 

16  241 


242    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

strength  of  their  positions  didn't  save  the  French. 
What  stopped  Germany  was  not  the  rampart  of  hills, 
forts,  and  trenches  about  Verdun,  but  an  ever  renewed 
rampart  of  living  men. 

France,  still  somewhat  inferior  to  Germany  in  weight 
of  artillery,  but  fully  equal  in  the  discipline  and  valour 
of  her  infantry,  didn't  shrink  from  the  ordeal.  At 
times  it  seemed  as  if  the  lines  around  Verdun  would 
break  under  the  stupendous  German  pounding.  They 
sagged;  but  they  were  never  broken.  After  a  hand- 
to-hand  struggle  which  lasted  many  months  French 
doggedness  triumphed. 

The  superb  military  quality  of  the  French  soldier 
never  stood  out  more  conspicuously  than  it  did  at 
Verdun.  For  Verdun  was  a  battle  of  units,  of  squads, 
of  individuals — for  inches  of  ground,  scraps  of  woods, 
footholds  on  hill-slopes — many  times  taken  and 
retaken.  Never  before  had  enormous  armies  grappled 
so  ferociously  for  weeks  and  weeks  in  so  restricted 
an  area. 

That  fact  enhanced  Verdun's  significance.  It  also 
gave  the  struggle  its  surpassing  moral  value.  French 
nerves  proved  equal  to  the  fiercest  strain  that  could 
be  put  upon  them  by  the  new  German  tactics  of  assault, 
based  on  unprecedented  artillery  concentration,  the 
use  of  special  shock  formations,  and  the  lavish  employ- 


Verdun  243 

ment  of  gas  waves,  flame  throwers,  and  shells  charged 
with  asphyxiating  and  tear-producing  gases. 

No  other  German  attack  on  the  West  Front  was  as 
sustained  and  vicious  as  that  at  Verdun.  When  it 
failed  France  breathed  more  freely.  The  indefinable 
prestige  of  German  arms  was  shaken.  Sedan  and 
Gravelotte  were  forgotten.  The  French  knew  that, 
so  far  as  their  armies  were  concerned,  the  German 
onslaught  could  be  stayed.  France's  future  was 
reasonably  secured,  barring  collapse  of  civilian  morale, 
due  to  defeatist  intrigues  or  war  weariness. 

On  the  German  side  Verdun  was  the  completest 
military  failure  of  the  war.  It  had  no  value  except 
as  an  experiment  in  attrition.  And  attrition,  pure  and 
simple,  was  a  policy  which  Germany  could  not  afford 
to  pursue.  The  German  strategic  reserve  which  was 
used  up  on  the  Meuse  would  have  sufficed  many  times 
over  to  deal  the  final  blow  to  Russia.  Hindenburg 
saw  this  clearly  and  from  the  beginning  he  opposed  the 
Verdun  campaign.  His  appointment  late  in  the  sum- 
mer to  succeed  Falkenhayn  as  Chief  of  Staff  was  a 
tardy  admission  by  the  controlling  military  clique 
that  German  strength  had  been  sapped  to  no 
purpose. 

The  strategical  conception  which  underlay  the  Ver- 
dun   operation    is    still    obscure.     In    October,    1916, 


244    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

when  the  Germans  still  held  positions  on  the  right 
bank  of  the  Meuse  from  which  they  could  look  down 
on  Verdun,  the  General  Staff,  departing  from  its  custom, 
issued  a  statement  intended  to  convey  the  idea  that 
the  purposes  which  Falkenhayn  had  in  view  were  in 
a  large  measure  accomplished.  But,  as  will  be  shown 
later,  the  purposes  were  neatly  trimmed  and  localized 
to  fit  the  actual  situation.  As  the  main  object  of  this 
publication  was  to  impress  the  German  public,  it  would 
be  foolish  to  accept  its  somewhat  artful  explanations 
at  face  value. 

While  the  battle  was  in  progress  Allied  critics  were 
prolific  in  interpretations  of  Falkenhayn's  strategy. 
In  chapter  ii  of  his  book  The  Assault  on  Verdun,  a 
Spanish  writer,  Senor  E.  Diaz-Retg,  has  summarized 
the  Allied  views  then  current.     They  are  in  brief: 

i.  That  Germany  turned  west  in  191 6  because 
the  chief  object  of  the  Balkan  campaign  had  been 
frustrated  by  the  creation  of  the  Allied  entrenched 
camp  at  Salonica. 

2.  That  the  Germans  expected  a  general  Allied 
offensive  in  France  in  the  spring  of  1916  and  wished 
to  "get  the  jump"  on  the  Allies  by  anticipating  it. 

3.  That  the  German  General  Staff  thought  a 
victory  in  the  West  was  desirable  in  order  to  stimulate 
war  loans  and  reconcile  the  German  civilian  popula- 
tion to  the  hardships  of  stricter  food  rationing. 

4.  That   possession   of    Verdun   was   needed   to 


Verdun  245 

protect  the  Briey  iron  district,  to  secure  Metz  from 
an  Allied  attack,  and  to  solidify  the  German  positions 
in  France. 

5.  That  the  General  Staff  believed  it  advisable 
to  strengthen  the  Hohenzollern  dynasty  by  staging 
an  offensive  in  the  West  in  which  the  Crown  Prince 
of  Prussia  should  be  the  shining  figure. 

These  reasons  are  far  from  convincing.  They  don't 
even  hang  together.  The  last  is  trivial.  The  Crown 
Prince  of  Prussia  has  testified  that  the  military  clique 
at  Grand  Headquarters  was  intensely  hostile  to  him. 
It  considered  him  a  dangerous  liability.  Its  only 
concern  about  him  was  to  immure  him  safely  some- 
where behind  the  lines  where  he  couldn't  interfere  in 
any  way  with  military  operations.  He  was  so  immured 
up  to  the  end  of  the  war.  There  is  nothing  to  show  that 
his  personal  interests  or  wishes  were  ever  consulted 
in  decisions  affecting  military  policy. 

Nor  was  the  German  General  Staff  ever  guilty  of 
the  weakness  of  fitting  its  strategy  to  the  exigencies 
of  domestic  politics.  It  controlled  public  opinion. 
There  was  no  public  opinion  in  Germany  except  that 
which  it  created.  The  German  civilian  population 
up  to  the  end  of  the  war  never  dreamed  of  questioning 
the  infallibility  of  judgments  reached  at  Grand  Head- 
quarters. Public  opinion  might  react  to  strategy. 
But  strategy  never  reacted  to  public  opinion. 


246    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

The  existence  of  the  Allied  intrenched  camp  at  Sa- 
lonica  imperilled  only  in  a  minute  degree  the  results  of 
the  Balkan  campaign.  A  Teuton  Mittel-Europa  had 
been  established  and  was  destined  to  an  enormous  en- 
largement whenever  Germany  should  resume  Eastern 
operations.  The  Salonica  camp  was  no  obstacle  to 
the  conquest  of  Rumania  in  191 6  or  the  dismember- 
ment of  Russia  in  191 8.  Through  1916  and  191 7  it 
was  to  serve  the  single  purpose  of  frustrating  a  Ger- 
man occupation  of  Greece.  Had  the  German  General 
Staff  thought  it  worth  while  to  eject  Sarrail's  army  from 
Macedonia,  it  could  have  done  so  in  191 6,  at  a  cost 
far  below  that  of  the  futile  attempt  on  Verdun. 

If  Germany  needed  a  spectacular  victory,  why  did 
she  not  seek  one  at  Salonica  instead  of  on  the  Western 
Front?  To  transfer  her  main  effort  to  the  West  in- 
volved a  reversal  of  the  sound  and  marvellously  success- 
ful policy  which  she  had  been  pursuing  since  January, 
1 91 5.  What  was  Falkenhayn's  ruling  motive  in  re- 
curring to  the  original  Moltke  programme  of  taking 
Paris  and  crushing  France? 

Evidently  he  must  have  thought  that  the  best  road 
to  Paris  lay  through  Verdun.  That  was  the  road  taken 
by  the  German  armies  in  1870.  Any  considerable 
progress  along  it  would  have  the  result  of  uncovering 
the  French  fortified  line  from  Toul  down  to  Belfort. 


Verdun  247 

1 1  would  carry  the  German  armies  south  of  the  Argonne 
and  south  of  Rheims  and  compel  a  more  considerable 
readjustment  of  the  Allied  front  in  France  than  would 
a  break-through  almost  anywhere  else  between  Nieu- 
port  and  the  Swiss  border. 

Falkenhayn,  in  turning  west  again,  was  simply 
yielding  to  the  lure  of  the  Moltke  tradition — to  the 
fixed  idea  of  the  Western  school  of  German  strategists. 
He  was  trying  to  do  what  the  younger  Moltke  had 
partly  succeeded  in  doing  in  1914,  and  what  Luden- 
dorff  partly  succeeded  in  doing  in  191 8.  But  since  his 
failure  was  absolute,  the  real  scope  and  purposes  of 
his  strategy  could  not  be  avowed.  In  order  to  cover 
up  his  humiliation  the  theory  was  put  forward  that  his 
operation  at  Verdun  had  only  a  limited  and  purely 
defensive  character. 

The  official  German  version  of  Falkenhayn  :s  strate- 
gical intentions  is  given  in  volume  xxi  of  the  Kriegs- 
berichte  aus  dem  Grossen  Hauptqimrtier ,  published  in 
1 91 6.  It  skilfully  adopts  and  elaborates  the  fourth  of 
the  theories  in  Senor  Diaz-Retg's  summary.  Verdun, 
it  says,  constituted  the  north-eastern  corner  pillar  of 
the  whole  French  defensive  system.  It  was  also  the 
chief  French  sally-port  for  an  offensive  against  Middle 
Germany.  It  was  the  most  dangerous  sally-port  of 
all,  since  an  offensive  out  of  it  would  put  the  French 


248    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

armies  in  the  rear  of  the  German  armies  on  the  Aisne 
and  Somme  fronts,  in  Artois  and  in  Belgium.  Further- 
more, French  possession  of  Verdun  was  a  standing 
threat  to  a  German  utilization  of  the  rich  coal  and 
iron  ore  deposits  of  the  Briey  district,  which  were  of 
immense  value  to  the  German  munitions  industry.  In 
short,  Verdun  was,  both  for  offensive  and  defensive 
purposes,  one  of  the  most  valuable  operation  bases  in 
French  control. 

The  inference  to  be  drawn  from  all  this  is  that  Fal- 
kenhayn  was  conducting  a  purely  defensive  operation, 
intended  to  make  the  German  positions  in  France 
more  secure  against  an  Allied  attack. 

The  last  paragraph  of  the  General  Staff's  exposition 
reads : 

It  had  not  been  possible  for  us  up  to  the  spring 
of  191 6  to  close  this  sally-port.  War  on  two  fronts 
had  kept  a  substantial  portion  of  our  forces  in  the 
Russian  and  Balkan  theatres.  Only  when  these 
forces  had  been  released  could  the  reduction  of 
Verdun  be  undertaken  with  this  strategic  purpose 
in  view:  first  to  close  the  French  sally-port,  so  far 
as  Germany  was  concerned,  and  then,  in  the  course 
of  further  operations,  to  swing  the  door  inward 
toward  France. 

In  this  last  phrase  only  is  there  any  intimation  that 
Falkenhayn  expected  to  use  Verdun  as  a  base  for  an 


Verdun  249 

advance  on  Paris.  Yet,  if  he  didn't,  why  did  he  con- 
tinue for  months  his  costly  effort  to  destroy  the  French 
bridgehead  east  of  the  Meuse?  It  is  highly  improbable 
that  he  ever  took  seriously  the  various  weighty  con- 
siderations marshalled  in  the  General  Staff  bulletin 
to  justify  his  attack  as  a  piece  of  sound  defensive 
strategy.  The  General  Staff  itself  didn't  take  them 
seriously,  either  then  or  later. 

Verdun  was  never  used  as  a  French  sally-port  for 
an  invasion  of  German  Lorraine.  Metz  remained 
undisturbed  in  German  possession  until  the  armistice 
was  signed.  So  did  the  Briey  coal  and  iron  fields.  It 
was  extremely  improbable  that  France  would  ever 
undertake  an  offensive  from  the  Meuse,  so  long  as  the 
German  armies  remained  on  the  Aisne,  the  Oise,  and 
the  Somme.  In  Picardy  the  Germans  were  only  sixty 
miles  from  Paris.  In  1915,  1916,  and  191 7,  the  French 
were  never  strong  enough  to  risk  an  offensive  on  the 
Lorraine  or  Alsace  border.  It  was  not  until  the  very 
end  of  the  war,  when  the  American  armies  had  taken 
over  the  Lorraine  front,  that  Verdun  was  used  as  the 
base  for  an  Allied  offensive.  Had  the  war  lasted 
through  November,  19 18,  there  would  have  been  an 
American-French  offensive  directed  against  Metz. 
But  before  that  time  the  German  armies  which  had 
held    the    Aisne   and  Somme  fronts  and  the  Hinden- 


250    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

burg  Line  would  have  been  well  back  toward  the 
Rhine. 

In  fact,  German  strategy  in  France,  both  before  and 
after  Falkenhayn's  offensive,  completely  ignored  the 
threat  of  Verdun.  After  Falkenhayn's  dismissal,  Hin- 
denburg  tranquilly  went  ahead  completing  the  vast 
fortified  zone  which  bears  his  name.  From  that  zone 
Ludendorff  launched  the  great  offensive  of  191 8,  re- 
gardless of  the  existence  of  the  Verdun  sally-port.  He 
could  probably  have  made  a  successful  drive  south 
from  the  Argonne  or  east  from  the  St.  Mihiel  salient 
and  surrounded  Verdun,  if  he  had  thought  it  necessary 
to  do  so  in  order  to  solidify  the  German  defensive 
position  in  France. 

But  Ludendorff's  strategy  was  not  defensive.  Like 
Moltke  the  Younger,  and  Falkenhayn,  he  aimed  at  a 
military  decision  in  the  West.  He  drove  salients  in 
Picardy,  in  Flanders,  and  in  Champagne,  deeper  than 
those  which  the  Germans  held  in  191 5.  And  he  lost 
to  Foch  because  he  couldn't  defend  those  salients — 
not  because  his  armies  were  threatened  with  envelop- 
ment by  an  Allied  offensive  based  on  Verdun. 

Falkenhayn  undoubtedly  expected  to  repeat  Mac- 
kensen's  exploits  on  the  Dunajec.  He  employed  the 
same  means  and  the  same  tactics.  But  he  met  a  foe 
vastly  better  prepared  for  defence  than  the  Russians 


Verdun  251 

were  in  191 5,  and  far  superior  in  leadership  and 
morale. 

All  records  were  broken  by  the  German  artillery- 
concentration  against  the  arc  of  the  advanced  French 
line  north  of  Verdun  and  east  of  the  Meuse.  Macken- 
sen  is  supposed  to  have  used  two  thousand  guns  at  the 
Dunajec.  Falkenhayn  used  three  thousand  at  Verdun 
— most  of  them  of  the  newer  and  heavier  calibres. 

Topographical  conditions  greatly  favoured  the  artil- 
lery attack.  The  French  positions  on  the  east  bank  of 
the  river  curved  in  a  semicircle  from  Brabant,  on  the 
north,  to  the  Cotes  of  the  Meuse  on  the  south.  The 
northern  arc  was,  therefore,  not  only  subject  to  direct 
fire,  but  could  be  enfiladed  along  its  whole  length  by 
German  batteries  near  Forges,  on  the  west  bank,  and 
in  Spincourt  Wood,  to  the  north-east  of  Ornes.  The 
German  fire  on  February  21st  was  massed  consecu- 
tively on  the  various  segments  on  the  northern  eight- 
mile  front.  Its  intensity  may  be  judged  from  the 
statement  of  an  artillery  officer,  reported  by  Serior  Diaz- 
Retg,  that  eighty  thousand  projectiles  fell  in  an  area 
one  thousand  metres  long  by  five  hundred  to  six 
hundred  wide. 

As  at  the  Dunajec  and  in  the  French  attack  in  Cham- 
pagne, the  first -line  defences  were  blasted  away.  Woods 
were  razed  and  the  hillsides  were  ploughed  up.     Most 


252    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

of  the  men  in  the  trenches  were  either  killed,  wounded, 
or  stunned. 

But  the  defence  didn't  melt  away.  Fortunately 
for  the  French  the  advanced  lines  were  lightly  manned. 
There  were  only  one  hundred  thousand  French  troops 
in  the  Verdun  sector  and  they  were  evenly  distributed 
over  the  whole  front.  As  in  the  East,  the  German 
shock  phalanxes  advanced  at  the  end  of  the  bombard- 
ment, expecting  to  find  no  organized  resistance.  They 
took  many  prisoners.  But  all  along  the  line  French 
units  offered  fight.  They  sacrificed  themselves  in  or- 
der to  retard  the  German  advance.  It  took  the  shock 
infantry  four  days,  from  February  21st  to  February 
25th,  to  reach  the  main  French  line  of  defence  on  the 
north,  from  Samogneux  to  Forts  de  Douaumont  and 
Vaux. 

When  the  empty  shell  of  Fort  de  Douaumont  was 
taken  by  the  Brandenburg  division  on  February  25th, 
the  German  High  Command  thought  that  Verdun  was 
won.  But  on  that  day  the  real  French  defence  of  the 
fortress  had  only  begun. 

There  is  a  legend  of  Verdun,  just  as  there  is  a  legend 
of  the  Marne.  It  was  widely  published  and  believed 
in  1 91 6  that  the  French  High  Command  was  ready  to 
evacuate  Verdun  and  withdraw  all  the  French  forces 
to  the  west  bank  of  the  Meuse.     The  politicians  in 


Verdun  253 

Paris,  it  was  whispered,  vetoed  this  retirement  on  the 
ground  that  it  would  have  a  disastrous  moral  effect. 
It  has  been  intimated  by  some  military  writers  that 
preparations  for  evacuation  were  actually  made  prior 
to  February  25th. 

But  on  that  day  General  de  Castelnau  arrived  in 
Verdun.  He  sent  for  General  Petain  to  replace  General 
Herr,  the  commandant  of  the  entrenched  camp.  Later 
General  de  Langle  de  Cary,  in  command  of  the  Meuse 
sector,  was  superseded.  The  French  General  Staff 
took  notice  of  the  rumours  that  an  evacuation  was  at 
one  time  in  contemplation  or  under  way  by  issuing  the 
following  statement: 

At  no  moment  of  the  battle  of  Verdun  did  the 
High  Command  give  the  order  to  withdraw  the 
French  troops  on  the  right  bank  of  the  Meuse.  On 
the  contrary,  on  the  morning  of  February  23d,  General 
de  Langle  de  Cary  instructed  the  troops  on  the  right 
bank  that  every  point,  even  though  enveloped,  every 
height,  even  though  completely  surrounded,  must  be 
held  at  any  cost  and  that  there  was  but  one  order 
— to  resist.  On  the  night  of  the  24th  the  commander- 
in-chief  issued  orders  to  resist  on  the  whole  front 
between  the  Meuse  and  the  Woevre,  using  every 
means  available.  At  the  same  time  he  sent  General 
de  Castelnau  to  Verdun.  The  next  morning,  while 
en  route,  General  de  Castelnau  confirmed  by  tele- 
phone to  General  Herr  that,  in  accordance  with  the 
orders  of  the  general-in-chief,  the  positions  on  the 


254    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

right  bank  of  the  Meuse  must  be  held,  whatever 
the  cost.  Finally,  on  the  evening  of  the  25th, 
the  general-in-chief  sent  to  General  Petain,  on  his 
taking  command,  the  following  order : 

"I  gave  instructions  yesterday  to  resist  on  the 
right  bank  of  the  Meuse,  north  of  Verdun.  Any 
chief  who  should  give  an  order  to  the  contrary  would 
be  summoned  before  a  court-martial!" 

This  communication  doesn't  solve  all  doubts  as  to 
the  original  intentions  of  Generals  Herr  and  de  Langle 
de  Cary.  But  it  shows  clearly  that  from  February 
25  th  on  the  French  army  was  firmly  committed  to 
that  gruelling  test  of  endurance  on  the  heights  of  the 
Meuse  to  which  Falkenhayn  had  challenged  it. 

The  fighting  around  Verdun  divides  itself  into  several 
easily  distinguishable  phases.  The  first  phase  ended 
on  February  25th.  In  the  opening  five  days  the  Ger- 
mans broke  through  the  northern  face  of  the  semi- 
circular bridgehead  east  of  the  Meuse,  and  the  French 
troops  were  drawn  in  on  the  eastern  and  south-eastern 
faces.  Three  hundred  thousand  Germans  were  en- 
gaged against  about  one  hundred  thousand  French. 
Besides  their  losses  in  dead  and  wounded  the  French 
lost  between  ten  and  twenty  thousand  prisoners.  But 
this  was  the  ordinary  cost  of  holding  a  line  subject  to 
"drum  fire"  bombardment.  The  Germans  had  made 
an  advance  averaging  three  miles  on  the  whole  eastern 


Verdun  255 

front  and  at  Fort  de  Douaumont  they  were  in  sight 
of  Verdun. 

Petain's  arrival  was  the  signal  for  a  French  counter- 
attack. This  cleared  the  hill  on  which  Fort  de 
Douaumont  stood,  leaving  a  Brandenburg  battalion 
marooned  in  the  dismantled  work.  From  February 
26th  to  February  29th  there  was  continuous  fighting 
in  the  Douaumont  sector.  When  the  German  attack 
slackened  on  March  1st,  the  real  crisis  of  the  defence 
was  over. 

Petain  then  had  both  the  men  and  the  guns  to  hold 
the  positions  on  the  east  bank  of  the  Meuse.  He  had 
also  developed  the  method  of  counter-attack,  so  costly 
to  troops  which  had  already  made  great  sacrifices  to 
gain  a  position  which  in  their  weakened  condition  they 
couldn't  hold.  He  was  reducing  the  battle  of  Verdun 
to  a  series  of  infantry  actions  in  which  the  better  in- 
dividual fighting  qualities  of  the  French  infantry  were 
bound  to  tell  in  the  long  run.  And  after  March  1st, 
the  French  artillery  began  to  measure  up  to  the  German 
in  calibre  and  numbers. 

The  third  phase  of  the  battle  was  the  extension  of 
the  German  attack  to  the  left  bank  of  the  Meuse. 
Halted  at  Douaumont,  Falkenhayn  decided  to  try  to 
reach  Verdun  from  the  west.  Tactically  an  advance 
on  the  west  bank  had  been  made  unavoidable  by  the 


256    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

fact  that  the  French  batteries  on  that  side  could 
enfilade  the  more  advanced  German  line  on  the  east 
side  of  the  river.  The  left  bank  operation  began  on 
March  2d,  and  lasted  until  April  nth,  the  centre  of  the 
attack  being  shifted  gradually  farther  and  farther  west. 
The  Germans  gained  ground  persistently,  but  at  an 
enormous  cost.  Near  the  river  they  pushed  south  as 
far  as  the  famous  two-crested  Dead  Man's  Hill,  whose 
northern  crest  they  captured.  But  they  couldn't  get 
possession  of  the  southern  crest,  or  of  Hill  304,  to  the 
west  of  it,  the  two  keys  of  the  defence  on  this  part  of 
the  Verdun  front. 

In  order  to  facilitate  operations  against  Pepper  Ridge, 
on  the  east  bank,  Falkenhayn  set  out  to  carry  Goose 
Ridge,  on  the  west  bank.  In  order  to  envelop  Goose 
Ridge  he  tried  to  take  Dead  Man's  Hill.  In  order  to 
envelop  Dead  Man's  Hill  he  shifted  the  attack  to  Hill 
304.  Finally,  in  order  to  surround  Hill  304,  he  at- 
tempted to  smash  the  French  line  still  farther  west, 
between  Malancourt  and  Avocourt.  All  these  efforts 
broke  down  with  terrific  losses. 

Meanwhile  on  the  east  bank  the  Germans  made  a 
series  of  desperate  assaults  on  Fort  de  Vaux,  about  a 
mile  south  of  Fort  de  Douaumont.  These  lasted,  with 
intermissions,  from  March  8th  until  April  1st.  They 
were  a  complete   failure.     Then,  on   April    18th,    the 


Verdun  257 

third  phase  of  the  great  battle  ended  with  the  repulse 
of  an  assault  on  Pepper  Hill.  The  German  casual- 
ties now  reached  a  total  of  about  two  hundred 
thousand. 

Still  Falkenhayn  wouldn't  admit  defeat.  The  battle 
entered  its  fourth  phase  on  May  7th.  On  the  west 
bank  of  the  Meuse  violent  German  attacks  all  along 
the  line  culminated,  on  May  29th,  in  the  capture  of 
the  southern  summit  of  Dead  Man's  Hill.  Then  the 
attack  shifted  to  the  east  bank.  After  a  week  of  furious 
fighting  Fort  de  Vaux  was  taken. 

A  breach  was  thus  opened  in  the  main  French  line 
of  defence  north-east  of  Verdun.  Through  it  the  Ger- 
mans advanced  in  June  against  Fort  de  Souville,  two 
miles  south-west  of  Fort  de  Vaux.  They  made  some 
progress  and  fighting  continued  in  this  sector  through 
July.  But  the  British  offensive  on  the  Somme  now 
absorbed  German  attention.  The  assault  on  Verdun 
flagged  and  then  ended.  The  May  and  June  attacks 
resulted  in  at  least  one  hundred  thousand  additional 
German  casualties,  bringing  the  German  total  to  three 
hundred  thousand  or  over.  The  French  losses  were 
probably  somewhat  less. 

Verdun  was,  however,  still  closely  beleaguered.  The 
German  General  Staff  communication  of  October, 
1 91 6,  in  which  Falkenhayn's  strategy  was  elucidated, 


258    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

contained  this  complacent  statement  of  the  situation 
on  the  Meuse: 

What  our  troops  have  exhibited  in  the  way  of 
buoyant  aggressiveness,  in  a  stiff  defence  of  con- 
quered territory,  in  the  cheerful  endurance  of  unheard- 
of  hardships  and  sufferings  of  every  sort,  and  in  an 
undeniable  zest  for  battle,  stands  out  as  the  highest 
possible  example  of  heroism.  The  victory  which 
they  thereby  achieved  is  considerable.  We  can  look 
down  on  the  basin  of  Verdun,  on  the  city,  on  the 
Meuse  bridges  and  the  railroad  lines  and  are  able 
to  bring  them  all  under  destructive  fire.  Verdun's 
value  as  the  corner-stone  of  the  defence  of  the  French 
frontier  is  thus,  if  not  completely  destroyed,  at  least 
greatly  diminished.  Its  usefulness  as  a  bridgehead 
and  as  an  offensive  sally-port  is  absolutely  nullified. 

This  assurance  was  premature.  Almost  simultane- 
ously with  its  publication  General  Nivelle,  who  had 
succeeded  Petain,  started  a  counter-attack,  which 
broke  through  the  German  lines  for  a  two-mile  gain 
on  a  four-mile  front.  Douaumont  Fort  and  village 
were  recaptured.  A  few  days  later  Vaux  Fort  and 
village  were  retaken. 

On  December  13th  Nivelle  was  promoted  to  the 
command  of  all  the  French  armies  in  France.  His 
successor  at  Verdun,  General  Mangin,  started  another 
counter-offensive  on  December  15th.  This  broke  the 
German  line  on  a  front  of  six  and  a  quarter  miles  and 


Verdun  259 

regained  all  the  important  strategic  positions  on  the 
east  bank  of  the  Meuse.  In  these  two  brilliant  opera- 
tions the  French  took  about  twenty  thousand  prisoners 
and  suffered  very  slight  losses. 

The  door  for  a  French  invasion  of  German  Lorraine 
was  again  open.  But  the  French  were  never  to  use  it. 
This  fact  could  only  add  to  the  chagrin  of  the  German 
strategists  who,  merely  in  the  hope  of  closing  it  (if 
their  own  explanations  are  to  be  accepted),  had  sacri- 
ficed more  than  three  hundred  thousand  men. 

Among  the  great  struggles  of  the  war  Verdun  stands 
out  by  reason  of  its  duration  and  intensity.  It  was 
distinctly  a  soldiers'  battle.  It  heralded  in  a  way  the 
recovery  by  the  infantry  arm  of  its  once  proud  distinc- 
tion as  "the  queen  of  battles." 

Coming  in  the  mid-period  of  the  warfare  of  deadlock, 
it  disclosed  no  appreciable  disturbance  in  the  equation 
between  the  offensive  and  the  defensive.  The  defen- 
sive still  retained  the  upper  hand.  The  lightness  with 
which  the  advanced  French  lines  happened  to  be  held 
on  February  21st  may  have  conveyed  a  hint  to  the 
observant  of  the  coming  change  in  the  tactics  of  fixed 
positional  defence.  Also  in  the  continuous  resort  to 
counter-attack  the  final  answer  to  the  break-through 
after  irresistible  artillery  preparation  may  have  been 
vaguely  suggested. 


260    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

But  these  were  only  veiled  intimations.  The  Somme, 
which  followed  Verdun,  was  to  be  fought  largely  on  the 
old  lines.  The  complete  rehabilitation  of  the  power 
of  the  offensive  was  still  a  long  way  off. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

THE   SOMME — HINDENBURG'S    RETREAT 

Consciously  or  unconsciously,  the  battle  of  the 
Somme  was  the  supreme  effort  of  the  Allies  on  the 
Western  Front  to  break  away  from  the  sterile  policy 
of  "nibbling."  The  Somme  was  not  a  "bite."  Nor 
was  it,  except  in  appearance,  a  grandiose  experiment 
in  what  the  French  call  the  "war  of  usury."  It  was  a 
step — perhaps  in  the  dark,  but  still  an  important  step — 
toward  strategical  freedom  and  the  resuscitation  of  the 
warfare  of  movement. 

At  the  Somme  the  French  and  British  obviously 
aimed  at  breaking  through  the  German  front  and  com- 
pelling at  least  a  partial  German  retirement.  It  was 
their  answer  to  Verdun.  But,  as  was  the  case  with  the 
Germans  at  Verdun,  since  only  local  results  seemed 
at  the  time  to  have  been  obtained,  a  disposition  mani- 
fested itself,  after  the  operation  was  over,  to  qualify 
and  minimize  its  strategical  objectives. 

There  is  this  striking  difference,  however,  between 

Verdun  and  the  Somme.     The  German  offensive  was 

261 


262    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

absolutely  barren.  The  local  gains  on  which  the 
German  General  Staff  felicitated  itself  in  October,  191 6, 
were  wiped  out  before  the  end  of  the  year.  The  Somme 
offensive,  on  the  other  hand,  did  not  bear  its  real  fruit 
until  191 7.  It  had  the  retarded  effect  of  compelling 
Hindenburg's  "strategical  retirement"  out  of  the 
Noyon  salient. 

It  is  therefore  reasonable  to  assume  that  the  under- 
lying motive  of  the  Somme  offensive  was  always  to 
dislocate  the  German  front  south  of  Arras  and  to  un- 
cover from  the  north  the  salient,  curving  south-south- 
east from  below  the  Somme  through  Chaulnes  and 
Roye  to  Noyon,  which  constituted  the  apex  of  the 
German  position  in  France.  In  1918,  Foch  broke  the 
Montdidier  salient,  which  was  only  the  old  Noyon 
salient  extended  westward,  by  attacking  in  the  same 
manner  and  from  the  same  direction.  The  Allies  had 
failed  in  19 15  in  two  ambitious  attempts  on  the  flanks 
of  the  German  position — one  in  the  neighbourhood  of 
Lens  and  Arras,  the  other  in  eastern  Champagne.  It 
was  logical  enough  that  they  should  make  their  next 
attack  nearer  the  centre. 

The  battle  of  the  Somme  lasted  from  July  1st  until 
November  18th.  It  was  the  most  sanguinary  struggle 
of  the  war.  The  losses  on  both  sides  probably  ex- 
ceeded 1,200,000.     In  compai!son  with  this  immense 


The  Somme^Hindenburg's  Retreat  263 

expenditure,  the  results  achieved  by  the  offensive 
seemed  inconsiderable.  The  British  never  reached 
Bapaume.  The  French  never  reached  Peronne  or 
Chaulnes.  The  Germans  didn't  concede  defeat.  Until 
after  the  Hindenburg  retreat  the  Allies  were  hardly 
in  a  position  to  claim  a  victory. 

Perplexity  as  to  the  real  worth  of  the  offen- 
sive led,  for  a  time,  to  very  cautious  valuations  of  it. 
In  his  concise  and  modest  report  on  the  Somme 
operations,  published  on  December  29,  191 6,  Field 
Marshal  Sir  Douglas  Haig  said  that  their  object  was 
threefold : 

1.  To  relieve  pressure  on  Verdun. 

2.  To  assist  our  allies  in  the  other  theatres  of 
war  by  stopping  any  further  transfer  of  German 
troops  from  the  Western  Front. 

3.  To  wear  down  the  strength  of  the  forces 
opposed  to  us. 

This  summary  waives  aside  the  whole  question  of 
direct  or  immediate  strategical  objectives.  The  Ger- 
man General  Staff  claimed  nothing  but  local  objectives 
at  Verdun.  The  British  commander-in-chief  claimed 
nothing  but  general  objectives  at  the  Somme.  But  in 
neither  case  are  the  avowed  purposes  of  the  offensive 
reconcilable  with  its  tenacity  and  magnitude. 

If  the  Somme  is  to  be  judged  by  attainment  or  non- 


264    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

attainment  of  the  three  objects  specified  by  Sir  Douglas 
Haig,  it  was  much  more  of  a  failure  than  history  is 
likely  to  concede  it  to  be.  In  the  first  place,  it  was  not 
necessary  to  conduct  a  four  and  a  half  months'  battle 
in  Picardy — beginning  July  1st— in  order  to  relieve 
German  pressure  on  Verdun.  The  crisis  at  Verdun 
had  passed  long  before  July  1,  1916.  There  was  a  real 
crisis  early  in  February.  But  none  emerged  later. 
France  had  shown  that  she  intended  to  hold  Verdun 
and  that  she  was  able  to  hold  it.  JofTre  was  not  obliged 
to  defend  Verdun  on  the  Somme.  He  would  not  have 
been  likely  to  involve  himself  in  a  large  and  costly 
offensive  for  Peronne,  if  he  had  any  idea  that  Verdun 
was  in  danger.  No  Frenchman  would  have  thought 
of  swapping  Verdun  for  Peronne. 

JofTre  said  to  Serior  E.  Diaz-Retg,  the  author  of  The 
Attack  on  Verdun:  "At  no  time  did  we  believe  that 
Verdun  would  be  taken. " 

A  British  offensive  at  any  point  of  the  Western  Front 
could  not  help  having  the  indirect  effect  of  absorbing 
German  reserves.  But  the  Russian  offensive  in  Volhynia 
and  Bukowina  had  already  begun  to  absorb  them 
before  July  1st.  The  Verdun  campaign  was  a  closed 
incident,  so  far  as  Germany  was  concerned,  before  the 
battle  of  the  Somme  opened.  The  threat  of  a  British 
attack  on  the  Picardy  front  was  sufficient  to  inhibit, 


The  Somme— Hindenburg's  Retreat  265 

after  June  ist,  the  further  prosecution  of  Falkenhayn's 
disastrous  venture  on  the  Meuse. 

If  a  British  offensive  on  the  Somme  was  not  needed 
to  relieve  German  pressure  on  Verdun,  it  was,  on  the 
other  hand,  impotent  to  relieve  German  pressure  on 
the  Eastern  Front.  After  the  battle  of  the  Somme 
began  Brusiloff's  progress  toward  Lemberg  was  halted. 
Before  the  Somme  ended  Rumania  had  been  crushed. 
With  their  severed  fronts,  the  Western  and  Eastern 
Entente  Powers  were  never  able  to  give  one  another 
any  real  assistance.  Allied  offensives  in  France,  in 
191 5,  couldn't  save  Russia  or  Serbia.  They  couldn't 
stave  off  Allied  failure  in  Gallipoli.  Similarly,  in  1916, 
they  were  powerless  to  sustain  Russia  or  to  save 
Rumania. 

The  only  Allied  army  which  could  intervene  effectively 
in  Rumania's  behalf  was  Sarrail's,  holding  the  in- 
trenched camp  of  Salonica.  But  this  force  was  too 
weak  to  do  more  than  make  a  feeble  demonstration 
against  Bulgaria,  which  was  to  end  with  a  trivial  ad- 
vance as  far  as  Monastir.  In  so  far  as  the  Somme  was 
intended  to  demonstrate  the  efficacy  of  joint  Allied 
action  on  two  isolated  fronts  against  an  enemy  holding 
interior  lines,  it  was  a  fiasco.  It  could  not  well  be 
anything  else;  for  the  theory  it  was  demonstrating 
was  an  illusion. 


266    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

On  the  assumption  that  the  French  and  British 
fought  the  Somme  in  order  to  check  Germany's  trium- 
phal progress  in  the  East,  the  Germans  were  entitled 
to  claim  a  victory.  Such  an  opportunity  was  not  over- 
looked by  the  German  General  Staff,  when  it  issued, 
in  November,  191 6,  its  official  summary  of  the  Somme 
operations.  After  commenting  sarcastically  on  the 
singularly  restricted  strategic  aims  announced  in  Paris 
and  London  it  said: 

The  second  of  these  modest  objectives  amounted 
to  this:  "Can  we  succeed  in  tying  up  so  much  of  the 
enemy's  available  forces  that  Germany  will  be  at 
least  unable  to  put  sufficient  forces  at  the  disposition 
of  her  south-eastern  allies,  either  to  protect  them 
against  the  new  Balkan  belligerent  (Rumania)  or  to 
help  them  conquer  her?"  .   .   . 

To  this  question  our  answer  is :  "  We  have  held 
our  Western  Front  and  nevertheless  been  able  to 
release  enough  men  not  only  to  bring  the  Russian 
offensive  to  a  standstill,  but  also  to  snatch  from  the 
jaws  of  the  new  enemy  his  stolen  plunder  and  to 
assist  the  Bulgarians  in  recovering  the  lands  in  the 
Danube  Delta  of  which  they  were  robbed.  Already 
the  Balkan  passes,  the  gates  to  the  heart  of  Rumania, 
are  in  our  hands."  .  .  .  To  the  Entente's  claim  of 
strategical  success  we  enter  this  denial:  "A  liberated 
Transylvania,  a  conquered  Dobrudja." 

Had  the  German  bulletin  writer  waited  a  month 
longer  he  might  have  added :  "An  occupied  Bucharest." 


The  Somme— Hindenburg's  Retreat  267 

The  Somme  saw  attrition  on  a  stupendous  scale.  The 
new  British  armies  had  their  first  test.  And  the  test 
was  prodigal.  The  North  cried  out  in  horror  in  1864 
at  the  butchery  of  Cold  Harbour.  The  Somme  was 
one  Cold  Harbour  after  another.  The  British  loss 
from  July  to  December  was  approximately  450,000. 
The  French  loss  may  have  been  250,000.  The  Germans 
probably  lost  between  500,000  and  600,000  men,  of 
whom  more  than  65,000  were  taken  prisoners. 

But  on  this  showing,  the  Allied  policy  of  wearing 
down  the  enemy — if  it  was  a  deliberate,  primary  policy 
— hardly  justified  itself.  The  attrition  theory  was  one 
of  the  survivals  from  the  earlier  days  of  the  war,  when 
Entente  paper  man-power,  based  on  population,  ex- 
ceeded Teuton  man-power  more  than  two  to  one.  But 
the  Russian  collapse  had  shown  that  mere  numbers 
were  not  a  decisive  factor  in  the  military  equation. 
After  the  subsidence  of  BrusilofTs  offensive  and  the 
conquest  of  Wallachia,  Russian  man-power  ceased  to 
count.  The  seeds  of  the  revolution  had  already  been 
sown.  Russian  dissolution  was  approaching.  And 
with  Russia  practically  out  of  the  war,  the  United 
States  showing  no  signs  of  entering  it,  and  Japan  de- 
clining to  send  troops  to  Europe,  something  like  equal- 
ity in  numbers  seemed  about  to  be  restored. 

Looked  at  from  this  angle,  the  Somme  was  as  danger- 


268    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

ous  a  drain  on  Allied  fighting  strength  as  it  was  on 
German.  It  had  suddenly  become  as  important  for 
France  and  Great  Britain  to  husband  their  man-power 
as  it  was  for  Germany.  To  fight  without  a  clear  stra- 
tegical objective,  simply  for  the  purpose  of  "wearing 
down,"  ceased  to  be  sound  policy.  And  the  best  results 
in  the  way  of  attrition — if  attrition  was  the  only  aim — 
were  still  to  be  had  by  fighting  on  the  defensive. 

Some  perception  of  this  truth  became  noticeable  in 
the  Allied  operations  on  the  West  Front  after  191 6. 
There  were  no  more  Sommes.  Both  the  British  and 
the  French  (the  French  especially)  began  to  limit  their 
offensives,  wisely  awaiting  the  time  when  the  offensive 
should  definitely  get  the  upper  hand  of  the  defensive. 
For  the  Germans  the  effects  of  the  Verdun  lesson  lasted 
through  191 7.  They  adjusted  their  defensive  to  the 
new  conditions  imposed  on  it  by  the  devastating  effect 
of  artillery  fire  on  first-line  trenches,  strongly  held, 
and  then  adhered  to  it,  except  in  operations  like  those 
of  the  Crown  Prince  of  Prussia's  armies  in  the  Rheims- 
Soissons  sector,  which  were  largely  in  the  nature  of 
grand  scale  counter-attacks. 

The  Somme,  whatever  other  strategic  purpose  may 
be  ascribed  to  it,  made  the  first  real  breach  in  the  Ger- 
man defensive  system  in  Northern  France.  The  Ger- 
man line  ran  slightly  south-west  from  Arras  down  to 


The  Somme — Hindenburg's  Retreat  269 

Fricourt — a  village  a  couple  of  miles  east  of  Albert. 
There  it  turned  east  at  a  right  angle  for  about  eight 
miles.  Then  it  ran  south  to  the  Somme  River.  Be- 
low the  river  it  bulged  out  again,  passing  in  front  of 
Chaulnes  and  Roye  and  curving  east  near  Lassigny 
to  form  the  Noyon  salient. 

The  purpose  of  the  Anglo-French  attack  was  to 
drive  a  deep  wedge  between  the  Arras  sector  and  the 
Noyon  sector.  The  British  were  to  advance  north 
across  the  southern  face  of  the  right  angle,  whose  apex 
was  at  Fricourt,  meanwhile  containing  the  Germans 
on  the  western  face.  Bapaume,  nine  miles  away,  was 
the  ultimate  British  objective.  The  immediate  ob- 
jective was  an  east  and  west  ridge  running,  roughly, 
from  the  Tortille  River  to  the  Ancre. 

The  French  were  to  support  the  British  left  and  were 
also  to  move  east  on  a  long  front  toward  Peronne, 
five  and  three  quarters  miles  away  (situated  in  the 
angle  where  the  course  of  the  Somme  changes  from 
north  to  west) ,  and  toward  the  general  line  of  the  Somme 
south  of  that  city.  A  deep  salient  was  thus  to  be  driven 
with  its  tip  to  the  north-east  of  Combles. 

The  French  made  more  rapid  progress  than  the 
British.  In  the  fortnight  between  July  1st  and  July 
15th,  they  advanced  their  line  south  of  the  Somme  to 
a  maximum  depth  of  six  miles  on   a  ten-and-a-half- 


270    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

mile  front.  They  reached  the  western  bank  of  the 
river  opposite  Peronne.  They  took  12,250  prisoners. 
The  British  in  the  same  period  advanced  their  line 
to  a  maximum  depth  of  three  miles  on  a  ten-mile  front 
and  took  10,000  prisoners. 

The  French  drive  was  halted  after  July  15th  by  fierce 
German  counter-attacks.  South  of  the  Somme  fight- 
ing died  down,  although  early  in  September  and  also 
in  October  General  Joffre  made  a  considerable  effort 
to  capture  Chaulnes,  the  key  to  the  German  positions 
south  of  Peronne.  The  French  turned  their  attention 
instead  to  helping  out  the  British  on  the  northern  part 
of  the  battle  front,  co-operating  in  the  extension  of  the 
Allied  salient  east  and  north-east  of  Combles. 

The  British  reached  the  southern  crests  of  the  cross- 
ridge  from  the  Tortille  to  the  Ancre  by  July  15th. 
The  rest  of  July  was  spent  in  consolidating  these  posi- 
tions behind  the  original  German  first  line  and  beating 
off  counter-attacks.  There  was  an  interlude  in  August. 
The  heavy  guns  had  to  be  brought  forward  for  a  new 
blasting  operation.  This  began  on  September  2nd 
and  lasted  through  the  month. 

The  British  attacked  with  tremendous  energy,  and 
the  chief  centres  of  German  resistance  on  the  cross- 
ridge  fell  one  after  the  other.  Guillemont  and  Ginchy 
were  taken  on  September  3d,  Martinpuich  and  Cour- 


The  Somme- Hindenburg's  Retreat  271 

celette  on  September  15th,  Les  Bceufs  and  Morval  on 
September  25th.  Thiepval,  on  the  western  end,  and 
Combles,  on  the  eastern,  still  held  out.  But  the  French 
had  already  penetrated  east  of  Combles  and  now  en- 
veloped that  town  from  the.  south  and  west.  It  was 
evacuated  on  September  26th.  On  the  same  day 
Thiepval  was  stormed  by  the  British,  who  also  pushed 
forward  in  the  centre  to  Gueudecourt,  a  mile  north 
of  the  ridge. 

The  toll  of  these  operations  was  ghastly.  Divisions 
in  the  line  had  to  be  constantly  replaced.  The  offen- 
sive slowly  died  down.  October  was  excessively  cloudy 
and  rainy.  The  Allied  salient  was  extended  north- 
east of  Combles  when  the  French  captured  Sailly  and 
Saillisel.  The  last-named  village  was  lost  repeatedly 
and  didn't  pass  permanently  into  Allied  possession 
until  late  in  November.  In  October  the  British  pushed 
forward  their  front  in  the  centre  as  far  as  Le  Sars, 
four  miles  south-west  of  Bapaume.  In  November  they 
extended  their  gains  westward  by  eliminating  a  small 
German  salient  west  of  the  Ancre  River.  The  total 
area  reconquered  was  approximately  120  square  miles. 

The  crisis  of  the  battle  of  the  Somme  was  reached 
in  the  last  week  of  September.  The  British  and  French 
had  concentrated  their  attack  at  the  point  of  the 
salient  which  they  were  driving  past  Combles  toward 


272    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Bapaume.  By  a  terrific  effort  they  cleared  the  ridge 
which  was  the  backbone  of  the  second  German  line 
of  defence.  But  having  cleared  it  they  were  unable 
to  go  any  farther.  The  October  intermission,  which 
followed,  marked  a  virtual  abandonment  of  the  Somme 
operation,  so  far  as  it  had  aimed  at  a  large-scale  pene- 
tration of  the  German  lines  in  Picardy. 

The  German  official  report  notes,  not  without  justi- 
fication, four  different  phases  in  the  Allied  attack. 
The  first,  covering  July,  was  an  ambitious  attempt  to 
break  through  both  toward  Bapaume  and  toward 
Peronne.  Near  the  end  of  July  this  attempt  confined 
itself  more  and  more  to  a  broadening  out  of  the  Allied 
salient  north  of  the  Somme.  In  August  there  was  a 
lessened  pressure  on  all  parts  of  the  front.  The  third 
phase  came  in  September  with  a  renewal  north  of  the 
Somme  of  the  breaking-through  effort  at  the  point  of 
the  salient,  on  both  sides  of  Combles.  This  brought 
the  Allies  their  maximum  tactical  success  and  also 
substantial  gains  in  territory.  It  ended  in  temporary 
exhaustion  and  was  never  renewed.  The  fourth  phase, 
in  October  and  November,  was  distinguished  by  a 
return  to  broadening-out  tactics.  It  was  the  beginning 
of  the  end. 

By  October  the  German  situation  on  the  Eastern 
Front  had  been  entirely  relieved  and  ample  provision 


The  Somme— Hindenburg's  Retreat  273 

had  been  made  for  the  campaign  against  Rumania. 
Turkish  troops  had  been  brought  up  to  Galicia  and 
Bukowina.  The  drain  on  German  reserves  was  over. 
Hindenburg,  who  had  succeeded  Falkenhayn  as  the 
German  Chief  of  Staff,  was  able  to  send  heavy  rein- 
forcements to  the  West  and  these  reinforcements  barred 
the  way  of  the  Allies  to  Bapaume. 

The  German  report  on  the  Somme,  published  early 
in  November,  191 6,  says: 

The  strengthening  of  the  German  defence  since 
the  critical  25th  of  September  has  made  such  pro- 
gress that  today  we  oppose  to  the  enemy  a  strength 
which  offsets  his  numerical  superiority,  thanks  to 
the  better  fighting  quality  of  our  troops  of  all 
arms. 

German  troops  on  the  Somme  front  in  November, 
191 6,  were  far  from  excelling  the  Allied  troops  in  quality. 
But  there  was  a  much  nearer  approach  to  equality  in 
numbers  then  than  there  had  been  in  the  summer  and 
early  fall. 

The  Somme  was,  in  the  main,  a  battle  of  the  rigid 
positional  type.  Yet  it  represented  material  progress 
toward  open  fighting  and  freedom  of  movement.  The 
area  conquered  was  many  times  larger  than  the  area 
conquered  in  the  battle  of  Artois  or  the  battle  of  Cham- 
pagne.    And  the  real  effects  of  the  dislocation  of  the 


274    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

German  line  were  to  be  disclosed  four  months  later 
in  the  Hindenburg  retreat. 

Field  Marshal  Haig  noted  in  his  report  that  cavalry 
was  used  in  High  Wood  on  July  14th.  General  Sir 
Henry  Rawlinson,  commanding  the  British  Fourth 
Army,  evidently  had  a  considerable  body  of  cavalry, 
in  reserve,  for  use  in  case  of  a  break-through.  Troops 
fighting  on  horseback  were  a  piquant  reminder  of  con- 
ditions which  trench  warfare  had  threatened  to  abolish. 

At  the  Somme,  too,  tanks  were  used  for  the  first 
time,  co-operating  with  an  infantry  assault.  This 
happened  on  September  15th,  when  early  in  the  morn- 
ing, as  the  Haig  report  says,  "tanks  were  seen  to  be 
entering  Flers,  followed  by  large  numbers  of  troops." 

This  was  an  historical  occasion;  for  the  tank  was 
destined  to  play  a  commanding  role  a  little  later  in 
revolutionizing  offensive  tactics  and  readjusting  the 
balance  between  the  offensive  and  the  defensive. 

The  potentiality  of  the  new  weapon  was  promptly 
indicated,  as  may  be  judged  from  the  following  passage 
in  the  British  Field  Marshal's  statement: 

On  the  same  day  [September  26th]  Gueudecourt 
was  carried  after  the  protecting  trench  to  the  west 
had  been  captured  in  a  somewhat  interesting  fashion. 
In  the  early  morning  a  "tank"  started  down  the 
portion  of  the  trench  held  by  the  enemy,  from  the 
north-west,  firing  its  machine  guns  and  followed  by 


The  Somme- Hindenburg's  Retreat  275 

bombers.  The  enemy  could  not  escape,  as  we  held 
the  trench  at  the  southern  end.  At  the  same  time 
an  aeroplane  flew  down  the  length  of  the  trench, 
also  firing  a  machine  gun  at  the  enemy  holding  it. 
These  then  waved  white  handkerchiefs  in  token  of 
surrender,  and  when  this  was  reported  by  the  aero- 
plane, the  infantry  accepted  the  surrender  of  the 
garrison.  By  8.30  a.m.  the  whole  trench  had  been 
cleared,  great  numbers  of  the  enemy  had  been  killed, 
and  eight  officers  and  362  of  the  ranks  made  prisoners. 
Our  total  casualties  amounted  to  five. 

The  German  defence  systems  in  the  region  between 
the  Somme  and  the  Ancre  were  among  the  most  formid- 
able on  the  Western  Front.  They  were  held  strongly, 
in  accordance  with  the  defensive  theories  and  methods 
of  the  earlier  phases  of  trench  warfare.  But  the  British 
attack  demonstrated  that  front  defensive  lines,  how- 
ever strong,  could  be  demolished  or  smothered  by  artil- 
lery fire.  German  experience  in  the  trying  period  from 
July  1st  to  November  1st  undoubtedly  led  to  the  revi- 
sion of  the  scheme  of  defence,  which  was  to  be  put  into 
effect  in  191 7.  This  scheme  called  for  a  forezone  lightly 
held,  with  many  small  centres  of  resistance,  the  main 
defence  being  withdrawn  a  mile  or  more  to  the  rear. 
It  also  required  more  dependence  to  be  placed  on 
counter-attacks,  which  were,  in  fact,  a  characteristic 
of  the  German  defensive  on  the  Somme  from  September 
on  until  the  end  of  the  battle.     This  change  worked 


276    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

steadily  to  lighten  the  burden  of  the  offensive 
and  to  increase  correspondingly  the  burden  of  the 
defensive. 

This  radical  transformation  of  German  tactics  was, 
in  fact,  disclosed  in  the  supplementary  battle  of  the 
Somme,  in  February  and  March,  191 7.  Field  Marshal 
Haig  then  shifted  his  main  attack  to  the  Ancre  Valley, 
approaching  Bapaume  from  the  west.  Good  progress 
was  made  during  February.  On  February  25th,  when 
the  British  stormed  the  German  first  system  of  trenches, 
running  from  north  of  Gueudecourt  to  Serre,  on  the 
west  side  of  the  Ancre,  they  discovered  that  the  enemy 
front  line  was  held  only  by  machine  gun  squads  in 
selected  positions,  the  infantry  and  artillery  having 
retired  a  considerable  distance.  By  March  10th  the 
British  drew  close  in  on  Bapaume  from  the  south  and 
west.  But  Hindenburg  had  already  decided  to  yield 
it  without  a  fight. 

The  great  German  "strategic  retirement"  of  191 7 
was  already  under  way  early  in  March.  But  the 
Allies  didn't  become  aware  of  the  movement  until 
March  15th.  The  British  entered  Bapaume  and 
Chaulnes  on  March  17th  and  Peronne  on  March  18th. 
The  German  armies  had  razed  clean  the  zone  from 
which  they  were  withdrawing  and  pursuit  was  difficult 
and  ineffective.     The  area  evacuated  covered  over  one 


The  Somme — Hindenburg's  Retreat  277 

thousand  square  miles  and  before  the  war  had  contained 
a  population  of  about  two  hundred  thousand. 

Hindenburg  withdrew,  generally  speaking,  out  of  the 
great  Noyon  salient,  established  in  the  fall  of  1914, 
after  the  Battle  of  the  Aisne.  The  rim  of  the  salient 
ran  originally  from  the  heights  north  of  Soissons  north- 
west through  Noyon  to  Roye,  and  thence  north  past 
Chaulnes  to  Albert  and  Arras.  It  was  called  the  Noyon 
salient  because  Noyon  was  situated  near  its  apex  and 
was  the  point  in  it  nearest  to  Paris. 

But  at  the  time  of  the  retreat  this  larger  salient  had 
been  broken  into  two  smaller  salients,  as  a  result  of  the 
Allied  operations  on  the  Somme.  A  blunt  wedge  had 
been  driven  into  the  German  positions,  the  tip  of  it 
due  east  of  Albert  and  due  north  of  Peronne.  The 
northern  German  segment  had  assumed  the  form  of  an 
isosceles  triangle,  with  the  apex  at  Arras.  The  western 
side  and  the  southern  base  were  both  under  strong 
pressure  from  the  British,  who,  if  they  took  Bapaume, 
would  be  in  a  position  also  to  envelop  the  triangle  from 
the  east. 

The  German  positions,  west  of  the  Arras-Bapaume 
highroad,  had,  in  fact,  become  valueless  for  armies 
standing  on  the  defence. 

South  of  the  Somme  the  situation  was  a  little  less 
precarious.     But  if  Peronne  should  be  lost  and  with  it 


278    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

control  of  the  river  between  Peronne  and  Nesle,  the 
whole  Noyon  front  could  be  outflanked  and  rolled  up. 

Hindenburg  therefore  made  a  virtue  of  an  obvious 
necessity.  His  retirement  was  not  voluntary,  except 
in  the  sense  that  he  was  wise  enough  to  anticipate 
the  disastrous  effects  of  a  renewal  of  the  battle  of  the 
Somme.  By  withdrawing  unmolested  and  with  a  great 
parade  of  strategical  prevision  and  mechanical  pre- 
cision of  execution,  he  gave  his  operation  an  appearance 
of  self-determination.  The  Germans  boasted  of  the 
retreat,  with  its  barbarous  devastation  of  the  territory 
surrendered,  as  a  prudent  extrication.  They  refused 
to  see  that  it  involved  a  concession  that  the  direct 
strategical  object  of  the  Allied  offensive  on  the  Somme 
had  been  attained — something  which  the  Allied  com- 
manders had  been  chary  about  asserting  and  which 
the  German  General  Staff  had  vehemently  denied. 

The  maximum  German  retirement  was  about  twenty- 
five  miles,  from  Chaulnes  and  Roye  to  a  line  running 
between  St.  Quentin  and  La  Fere.  Above  Peronne 
it  averaged  about  ten  miles.  On  the  south  the  new 
system  joined  up  with  the  old  one  along  the  Ailette 
River,  near  Coucy.  It  ran  north  to  La  Fere,  on  the 
Oise,  and  up  the  Oise  Valley  to  Moy.  Thence  it  turned 
north-west  to  St.  Quentin,  which  remained  nearly 
encircled  by  the  French.     Thence  it  ran  in  front  of 


The  Somme— Hindenburg's  Retreat  279 

Le  Catelet,  passed  Cambrai,  four  or  five  miles  to  the 
west,  and  ended  at  Arras.  It  was  modified  in  the  spring 
of  1917,  after  the  battle  of  Arras,  when  the  Germans 
fell  back  to  the  Siegfried  line,  running  north  from 
Queant  to  the  neighbourhood  of  Lens.  Except  for 
this  recession  the  great  barrier  stood  unbroken  until 
the  fall  of  1 91 8. 

In  the  broad  strategic  sense  Hindenburg's  retirement 
marked  the  final  step  toward  that  change  in  German 
military  policy  which  he  had  long  had  at  heart.  He  had 
won  his  fame  on  the  East  Front.  He  had  been  the 
chief  builder  of  Mittel-Europa.  Now  he  wanted  to 
consolidate  Germany's  enormous  gains  in  Russia  and 
the  Balkans,  where  the  cost  of  conquest  was  light,  while 
tiring  out  France  and  Great  Britain  by  a  cautious 
defensive  in  the  West.  That  was  the  true  German 
policy,  from  which  Verdun  was  a  flagrant  departure. 

At  the  time  Hindenburg  was  withdrawing  to  what 
he  considered  an  invulnerable  defence  line  in  France 
the  Russian  revolution  had  arrived.  As  a  military 
power  Russia  was  to  die  slowly.  But  she  was  certain 
to  die.  Then  Germany  would  have  troops  enough  to 
carry  the  war  to  a  draw  in  the  West — which  for  her 
would  mean  victory. 

The  Hindenburg  line  was  intended  as  a  symbol  of 
the  permanency  of  the  German  occupation  of  Northern 


280    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

France.  It  was  not  meant  to  be  a  threat  to  Paris, 
nor  a  "jumping  off"  point  for  another  expedition  below 
the  Marne.  Ludendorff  used  it  as  such  in  1918.  But 
he  was  then  demonstrating  his  own  strategy,  not  Hin- 
denburg's.  The  great  barricade  which  the  latter 
erected  defied  French  and  British  assaults  all  through 
191 7.  It  would  probably  have  defied  them  through 
19 1 8  and  191 9,  if  madness  at  Berlin  had  not  driven 
America  into  the  war. 

But  even  before  Hindenburg  had  settled  down  in  his 
vast  system  of  field  fortifications,  his  strategical  scheme 
was  wrecked  by  Germany's  decision  to  summon  an- 
other and  more  powerful  enemy  into  the  arena,  to 
take  Russia's  place.  His  own  power  as  Chief  of  Staff 
had  passed  to  Ludendorff,  who  was  willing  to  tie  up 
Germany's  fortunes  with  the  insane  project  of  unre- 
stricted submarine  warfare. 


CHAPTER  XV 
Russia's  collapse — Rumania 

The  collapse  of  Russian  military  power  dates  from 
the  great  retreat  of  191 5.  The  defeats  of  that  year 
sealed  the  fate  of  the  old  order.  And  Russian  military 
power — such  as  it  was — was  bound  up  with  a  continu- 
ance of  the  old  order. 

Neither  the  government  nor  the  people  realized 
clearly  what  was  happening.  The  revolutionary  pro- 
cess was  hidden  and  for  that  reason  all  the  swifter  and 
more  fatal.  For  a  time,  in  fact,  both  the  government 
and  the  people  reacted  vigorously  to  the  Teuton  inva- 
sion. The  Czar  took  direct  command  of  the  armies. 
Among  the  military  leaders  there  was  no  thought  of 
quitting.  In  their  opinion,  the  disasters  of  191 5  could 
easily  be  repaired.  The  Western  Allies  and  the  United 
States  would  supply  guns  and  munitions  and  Russian 
man  power  was  practically  inexhaustible. 

The  machinery  of  internal  administration  had  broken 
down  to  a  considerable  extent.  It  was  supplemented 
by  the  activities  of  the  Zemstvos  and  other  public  bodies, 

281 


282    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

which  took  charge  of  sick  and  wounded  soldiers  and 
refugees  and  also  helped  to  supply  the  armies  with 
food  and  clothing.  In  191 6  the  war  had  become  more 
nationalized  and  popularized  than  ever  before.  But 
with  the  unloosening  of  individual  and  community 
energies,  the  foundations  of  the  Romanoff  autocracy 
were  sapped. 

The  political  complications  which  led  up  to  the  de- 
thronement of  the  Czar  are  still  obscure.  General 
Basil  Gourko,  who  as  acting  Chief  of  Staff  was  thrown 
into  close  relations  with  Nicholas  II  from  November 
23,  1 91 6,  to  March  7,  191 7,  describes  him  as  a  reason- 
able and  conscientious  commander-in-chief,  loyal  to  the 
Entente  and  thoroughly  interested  in  the  prosecution 
of  the  war.  He  readily  accepted  military  advice.  But 
General  Gourko  notes  that  this  amenability  did  not  ex- 
tend to  questions  of  internal  administration  and  politics. 

The  reason  for  this  is  plain,  as  Gourko  indirectly 
admits.  In  the  latter  field  Nicholas  was  not  his  own 
master.  He  was  under  the  influence  of  the  Czarina 
who,  in  turn,  was  controlled  by  reactionary  politicians 
and  mystic  adventurers  like  the  monk  Rasputin. 
Sturmer  and  Protopopoff  were  the  Czarina's  proteges. 
Apparently  they  maintained  themselves  in  power  by 
playing  on  her  morbid  solicitude  for  her  son's  succession 
and  the  future  of  the  dynasty. 


Russia's  Collapse— Rumania       283 

In  an  autocracy,  war  is  a  dangerous  experiment. 
It  shows  too  clearly  the  dependence  of  the  government 
on  the  people.  It  could  not  but  have  the  effect  in 
Russia  of  accelerating  the  desire  of  all  classes  for  a 
larger  measure  of  political  freedom.  Roda-Roda,  the 
Viennese  litterateur  and  war  correspondent,  wrote  in 
19 14  a  story  of  the  experiences  of  an  Austrian  Ukranian 
who  was  taken  prisoner  by  the  Russians.  The  Ukra- 
nian reported  an  intelligent  young  Cossack  officer  as 
saying:  "The  revolution  will  come,  whether  Russia 
wins  or  loses."  It  was  a  true  prophecy;  for  it  repre- 
sented an  instinct  deep  in  the  mind  of  the  Russian 
people. 

In  191 6,  hopes  of  a  revolution  centred  more  and  more 
in  the  Duma.  The  Duma,  therefore,  became  the 
bugbear  of  the  reactionary  politicians  who  had  the 
ear  of  the  imperial  family.  Protopopoff  calmly  un- 
folded to  Gourko,  early  in  191 7,  his  plan  for  suppressing 
the  Duma.  But  earlier  than  that  the  Czarina's  ad- 
visers had  evidently  turned  toward  the  idea  of  a  peace 
with  Germany  as  the  best  means  of  preserving  the 
imperial  prerogatives.  Stunner's  policy  was  pacifistic 
in  tendency  and  effect.  And  the  Russian  people  had 
come  by  191 7  to  distrust  the  Protopopoff  clique  not 
only  as  enemies  of  the  liberal  movement  but  also  as 
friends  of  Germany. 


284    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Political  conditions  were,  therefore,  shaping  them- 
selves all  through  191 6  for  the  revolution,  which  came 
in  March,  191 7 — apparently  like  a  bolt  out  of  a  blue 
sky.  Military  operations  in  191 6  were  not  directly 
affected  by  the  political  manoeuvres  at  Petrograd, 
except  in  so  far  as  some  of  the  Czarina's  extreme  fol- 
lowers may  have  established  secret  communications 
with  Berlin.  The  armies  continued  to  fight.  But, 
like  the  people,  they  had  lost  their  sense  of  personal 
loyalty  to  the  Romanoffs  and  when  the  revolution  came 
they  accepted  it  with  indifference. 

So  far  as  the  Russian  High  Command  was  concerned 
it  showed  no  chagrin  at  the  failure  of  the  Western 
Allies  to  come  effectively  to  Russia's  aid.  The  Rus- 
sians had  made  many  sacrifices  for  the  sake  of  influ- 
encing the  strategic  situation  in  the  West.  They  had 
invaded  East  Prussia  in  August,  19 14,  in  order  to  re- 
lieve German  pressure  on  France.  By  their  victories 
in  Galicia,  they  had  compelled  Germany  to  turn  east 
in  1915.  But  France  and  Great  Britain  had  accom- 
plished very  little  in  return  that  year,  when  the  German 
armies  were  driving  the  Russians  out  of  Galicia,  Poland, 
Lithuania,  and  Courland. 

Russia  was  to  play  the  same  generous  role  in  191 6. 
In  order  to  prevent  German  reinforcements  flowing 
west  to  the  Verdun  front  Kuropatkin  undertook  a  pre- 


Russia's  Collapse— Rumania       285 

mature  and  barren  winter  offensive  in  the  Dvina  sector. 
Later,  when  the  Austro-Hungarian  drive  down  the 
Adige  Valley  into  Northern  Italy  got  under  way, 
Brusiloff's  offensive  in  Volhynia  was  hurried  up.  It 
had  an  immediate  effect.  For  the  Austrian  command 
had  to  break  off  the  Italian  offensive  and  shift  troops 
east,  in  order  to  check  Brusiloff's  sensational  advance. 
Russia  again  did  her  part  as  a  faithful  ally  of  the  West- 
ern Powers.  But  the  result  was  that  she  exhausted 
her  strength  before  Rumania  entered  the  war  and  could 
not  make  good  on  her  earlier  promise  to  guarantee 
the  Rumanian  conquest  of  Transylvania. 

Russia  began  the  year  1916  with  an  offensive  against 
Czernowitz,  the  capital  of  Bukowina.  It  lasted  three 
weeks,  cost  sixty  thousand  casualties,  and  got  nowhere. 
The  Dvina  offensive  followed  in  March.  It  lasted  two 
weeks  and  cost  more  than  one  hundred  thousand  casu- 
alties. Again  the  strategical  results  were  nil.  Russian 
man-power  could  not  offset  German  superiority  in  ar- 
tillery and  in  the  mechanical  equipment  for  defensive 
trench  warfare. 

To  get  better  results  Russia  had  to  turn  south  and 
strike  at  "the  secondary  enemy,"  Austria-Hungary. 
Brusiloff's  great  offensive  of  June- August,  191 6,  was  a 
repetition  on  a  broader  scale  of  the  successful  Russian 
offensive   of   August-September,    19 14.     The   Austro- 


286    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Hungarians  were  again  caught  napping.  They  were 
decidedly  inferior  in  numbers,  and  in  artillery,  having 
transferred  many  divisions  and  heavy  guns  to  the 
Trentino.  With  a  lavish  use  of  munitions  and  of  men 
the  Russians  crashed  through  the  Austro-Hungarian 
lines  in  Volhynia,  Galicia,  and  Bukowina  to  a  depth  of 
from  twenty  to  fifty  miles.  Once  more  they  reached 
the  eastern  slopes  of  the  Carpathians. 

Brusiloff's  drive  had  been  prepared  for  by  an  accu- 
mulation of  guns  and  shells,  furnished  largely  by  Great 
Britain,  France,  and  Japan.  The  best  Russian  troops 
had  been  massed  in  the  south,  under  the  command  of 
the  most  energetic  field  generals,  including  Letchitsky, 
Scherbatchev,  Sakharov,  and  Kaledin.  The  drive  was 
originally  intended  to  coincide  with  Rumania's  entry 
into  the  war,  and  to  support  her  invasion  of  Transyl- 
vania. But  as  has  been  said,  Italian  necessities  ad- 
vanced its  date.  In  one  sense  this  was  fortunate; 
for  it  found  Austria- Hungary  with  her  hands  tied  in 
the  East. 

The  battle  was  fought  on  a  front  of  250  miles — in 
strange  contrast  with  the  restricted,  intensive  struggle 
which  was  just  dying  away  at  Verdun.  It  began  on 
June  4th.  The  greatest  initial  progress  was  made  in 
the  sector  about  Rovno,  the  eastern  extremity  of  the  fa- 
mous triangle  of  Volhynian  fortresses — Rovno,  Dubno, 


Russia's  Collapse— Rumania       287 

Lutsk.  Lutsk,  at  the  other  end  of  the  base  from  Rovno, 
and  Dubno,  at  the  southern  apex,  had  fallen  into  the 
hands  of  the  enemy  at  the  end  of  the  Teuton  drive  of 
19 1 5.  These  three  fortresses  had  been  built  to  protect 
Kiev  from  an  Austro-Hungarian  irruption  out  of  north- 
eastern Galicia. 

Moving  west  from  its  base  at  Rovno,  General  Kale- 
din's  army  encountered  two  divisions  of  Czecho-Slovaks 
or  South  Slavs,  which  cheerfully  surrendered.  A  gap 
was  thus  opened,  through  which  the  Russian  cavalry 
and  infantry  poured.  By  June  6th  they  had  entered 
Lutsk.  On  June  ioth  Dubno,  enveloped  from  the 
north,  was  evacuated.  By  June  23d  Kaledin's  forces 
were  about  twenty-five  miles  west  of  Lutsk,  where  the 
advance  was  suspended,  awaiting  developments  farther 
north  and  south.  To  the  south  Sakharov  was  held  up 
near  Tarnopol  for  a  time.  But  on  his  left,  Scherbatchev 
captured  Buczacz.  Letchitsky,  farther  down,  reached 
Czernowitz  on  June  21st. 

On  the  northern  battle  front  Kovel  now  became  the 
chief  Russian  objective.  It  was  an  important  railroad 
junction  and  Hindenburg  was  determined  to  hold  it 
at  any  cost.  On  July  4th  a  new  Russian  army,  under 
General  Lesh,  advanced  west  along  the  Kovel-Kiev 
railroad  and  in  three  days  reached  the  Stokhod  River, 
twenty  miles  east  of  Kovel.     Here  the  German  defence 


288    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

tightened  up,  and  although  Lesh,  supported  by  Kaledin, 
delivered  many  assaults  and  actually  passed  the  river 
at  two  places,  the  German  line  held  without  much 
difficulty.  In  fact,  wherever  German  troops  stood,  or 
furnished  a  considerable  stiffening,  BrusilofFs  drive 
made  no  material  progress. 

The  Russian  offensive  had  completely  relieved  Italy. 
Its  other  purpose,  from  the  point  of  view  of  general 
Allied  strategy,  was  to  link  up  the  Russian  front  with  the 
Rumanian.  Success  on  the  southern  front  therefore 
counted  more  than  success  on  the  northern  front.  After 
the  fall  of  Czernowitz,  Letchitsky's  armies  overran  Bu- 
kowina.  Cossack  cavalry  reached  Kimpolung,  on  the 
Rumanian  border,  on  June  23d,  and  then  pushed  west 
as  far   as   the   Carpathian   passes   into   Transylvania. 

Unfortunately  Rumania  was  not  yet  ready  to  declare 
war.  So  Letchitsky  turned  north  into  Galicia,  aiming 
at  the  Jablonitsa  pass  into  Hungary.  He  took  Kolo- 
mea  and  Delatyn  and  seized  the  northern  approaches 
to  the  pass.  After  a  month's  rest  he  renewed  the 
offensive  into  Galicia.  In  conjunction  with  Scher- 
batchev  he  captured  Stanislau  on  August  10th,  and 
this  operation  compelled  the  Bavarian  army,  holding 
the  sector  to  the  north,  to  draw  back  toward  Lemberg. 
But  by  the  end  of  August  the  Brusiloff  offensive 
was  over. 


Russia's  Collapse— Rumania       289 

It  had  had  an  amazing  success — at  least  on  the  sur- 
face. Seven  thousand  square  miles  of  territory  were 
recovered.  About  350,000  prisoners  had  been  taken, 
nearly  all  of  them  Austro-Hungarians,  perhaps  50,000 
of  them  Slavs  and  Transylvanian  Rumanians,  who 
had  voluntarily  given  themselves  up.  More  than  four 
hundred  guns  were  captured. 

It  was  Russia's  greatest  military  effort — and  practi- 
cally her  last.  The  offensive  was  pushed  fairly  close 
to  the  stage  of  exhaustion.  The  munitions  which  had 
been  accumulated  had  been  shot  away.  The  armies 
had  suffered  tremendous  losses — probably  equalling,  if 
not  exceeding,  those  of  the  enemy,  which  may  have 
totalled  six  hundred  thousand.  And  there  were 
political  reasons  for  halting  the  attack — the  dynastic 
reasons  which  now  shaped  the  policy  of  Sturmer,  Pro- 
topopoff  and  the  politicians  who  had  the  ear  of  the 
Czarina. 

General  Gourko  speaks  guardedly  of  the  causes  of 
the  stoppage  of  the  great  summer  offensive.     He  says: 

Of  course,  in  our  advance  we  took  into  account  the 
great  size  of  our  living  forces  and  utilized  them  to 
counterbalance  our  shortage  in  material  resources. 
The  event  showed  that  such  a  calculation  had  no 
sufficient  foundation.  However  excellent  the  living 
force  was,  however  high  its  warlike  spirit,  neverthe- 
less there  existed  a  limit.     One  cannot,  under  such 


290    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

conditions,  utilize  living  strength  against  dead  mate- 
rials. Moreover,  in  course  of  time,  as  the  operations 
draw  out,  the  stock  of  moral  force  wears  out,  while 
the  flow  of  material  force,  at  any  rate  with  our  ene- 
mies, remains  at  the  same  level. 

This  is  a  clear  acknowledgment  of  the  fundamental 
handicap  under  which  Russia  laboured  in  a  war  in 
which  she  was  cut  off  from  the  support  of  her  Western 
Allies.     Gourko  continues: 

In  this  way  the  advance  of  Brusiloff 's  troops  nearly 
ceased  about  the  end  of  August.  The  reason  lay, 
not  so  much  in  the  shortage  of  reserves — because 
these  reserves  were  sufficient  to  fill  a  part  of  the  new 
Austro-Rumanian  front — as  in  that  misfortune  which 
followed  us  from  the  very  outset  of  the  campaign, 
shortage  in  ammunition  for  the  artillery,  and 
particularly  for  the  heavy  guns. 

Nevertheless  the  weariness  of  the  troops  had  its 
effect  to  a  certain  extent.  But  there  can  be  no 
question  that  the  stoppage  of  the  advance  was  pre- 
mature and  founded  on  orders  from  Headquarters, 
under  a  pretext  which  could  not  be  openly  spoken 
about,  whereas  amongst  our  Allies,  if  not  in  the  press, 
such  reasons  were  publicly  mentioned  or  whispered. 

Brusiloff's  offensive  was  an  impressive  experiment 
in  attrition.  It  weakened  Austria-Hungary.  But  it  had 
no  permanent  beneficial  effects  in  the  way  of  reliev- 
ing the  strategical  situation.  The  relief  to  Italy  was 
incidental.     And  the  fact  that  Russia  had  exhausted 


Russia's  Collapse— Rumania       291 

herself  by  the  end  of  August  left  the  Allies  not  only 
powerless  to  reap  any  advantage  from  Rumania's  long 
delayed  entry  into  the  war,  but  also  condemned  them 
to  stand  by  helplessly  and  see  Rumania  sacrificed, 
as  Serbia  and  Montenegro  had  been  sacrificed  the  year 
before.  Once  more  in  the  Balkans  Allied  diplomacy 
and  strategy  were  to  show  themselves  blind  and  halt. 
Lack  of  Allied  unity  of  command  never  produced  more 
calamitous  consequences  than  those  which  flowed 
from  the  bungling  of  the  Gallipoli  and  Rumanian  cam- 
paigns. Had  there  been  an  Allied  generalissimo  in 
191 6,  with  the  vision  and  confidence  of  Marshal  Foch, 
Russia  might  have  been  saved  from  dissolution,  the 
Balkans  cleared  and  Constantinople  isolated  or  cap- 
tured. Here  were  the  elements  in  the  situation.  There 
was  an  Allied  army,  with  an  estimated  strength  of 
more  than  four  hundred  thousand,  in  the  entrenched 
camp  at  Salonica.  Half  of  Greece  had  broken  away 
from  Constantine's  rule.  There  was  a  provisional  pro- 
Ally  Greek  government  at  Salonica  under  Venizelos. 
The  Allied  fleet  dominated  Athens.  Constantine  could 
have  been  dethroned  and  expelled  in  191 6,  as  easily 
as  he  was  in  191 7.  Greece  would  then  have  entered 
the  war  and  Sarrail's  energies  would  not  have  been 
paralyzed  by  the  constant  threat  of  an  attack  from  the 
rear. 


292    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Rumania  had  an  army  of  six  hundred  thousand  men, 
at  least  twice  the  strength  of  the  Bulgarian  army.  If 
the  Russian  offensive  had  been  held  up,  as  originally 
planned,  until  Rumania  was  ready  to  strike,  and  had 
been  conducted  in  close  co-operation  with  Rumania 
(Italy  attacking  at  the  same  time  on  the  Isonzo  and 
the  French  and  British  on  the  Somme),  Bulgaria  could 
probably  have  been  overwhelmed  in  September,  191 6, 
the  Central  Powers  separated  from  Turkey  and  a  free 
passageway  opened  into  Russia  across  Bulgarian 
territory,  from  the  ^Egean  to  the  Black  Sea. 

Having  control  of  the  Black  Sea  and  the  Danube, 
Russia  could  easily  have  sent  south  in  the  fall  of  191 6 
some  of  the  armies,  whose  strength  was  wasted  earlier, 
striving  for  purely  local  results  on  the  Volhynian  front. 
From  Russia's  own  point-of-view  her  man-power  could 
be  put  to  far  better  use  in  the  Balkans  than  along 
the  Russian  battle  line.  No  objective  which  she  could 
reasonably  hope  to  reach  in  the  North  would  bring 
her  any  nearer  to  a  junction  with  her  Western  Allies, 
on  whom  her  salvation  in  the  way  of  adequate  supplies 
of  war  material  depended.  But  in  the  Balkans  she 
would  be  moving  steadily  toward  contact  witn  the 
army  of  Sarrail. 

Did  the  Allies  ever  entertain  this  larger  conception 
of  a  union  of  the  Russo-Rumanian  and  Macedonian 


Russia's  Collapse— Rumania       293 

fronts?  The  German  General  Staff  publications  re- 
peatedly credited  them  with  such  a  plan.  But  it  was 
never  avowed  by  the  Allies  themselves  and  practically 
nothing  was  ever  done  to  carry  it  through.  The  Allied 
diplomats  concluded  the  agreement  with  Rumania. 
It  bears  the  traces  of  their  workmanship;  for  in  it 
strategic  aims  are  subordinated  to  political  ones.  The 
skin  of  the  bear  was  divided  with  great  precision. 
But  no  provision  was  made  for  slaying  the  bear. 

There  was  an  alternative  strategical  plan — the  inva- 
sion of  Transylvania — and  that  was  chosen  probably 
because  it  harmonized  with  Rumania's  territorial 
aspirations.  Under  her  agreement  with  the  Allies 
she  was  to  have  Transylvania  and  the  greater  part  of 
Banat  of  Temesvar — two  non-Hungarian  portions  of 
the  kingdom  of  Hungary.  Her  natural  preoccupa- 
tion was  to  get  military  possession  of  them  at  once. 
As  soon  as  war  was  declared — on  August  28,  191 6, — she 
pushed  her  forces  through  the  Moldavian  and  Walla- 
chian  passes  into  Transylvania  and  also  sent  an  expedi- 
tion past  the  Iron  Gates  of  the  Danube  into  the  Banat. 

Russia  was  to  co-operate  in  the  invasion  of  Transyl- 
vania. But  to  do  so  the  Russians  had  first  to  force 
the  strongly  held  passes  of  the  Eastern  Carpathians. 
This  her  armies,  in  their  weakened  condition  at  the 
end  of  August,  were  never  able  to  do. 


294    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

After  the  Rumanian  debacle,  brought  on  in  large 
part  by  the  collapse  of  the  Rumanian-Russian  defence 
in  the  Dobrudja,  it  became  the  fashion  to  criticize 
Rumania  for  having  pushed  recklessly  across  the  Tran- 
sylvanian  border  in  defiance  of  Allied  advice.  Such 
criticism  was  made  in  ignorance  of  the  terms  of  the 
secret  treaty  between  Rumania  and  the  Entente,  which 
didn't  see  the  light  of  day  until  after  the  armistice  was 
signed. 

The  military  annex  to  this  treaty  pledged  Rumania. 
to  an  offensive  against  Austria-Hungary.  Article  IX 
of  this  convention  says:  "The  principal  object  of 
Rumanian  action  will  be  in  the  direction  of  Budapest 
through  Transylvania."  Russian  assistance  was  pro- 
vided for  in  this  stipulation  of  Article  II :  "The  Russian 
army  will  aid  by  vigorous  action,  notably  in  Bukowina." 
Russia  also  promised  to  send  into  the  Dobrudja  two 
divisions  of  infantry  and  one  division  of  cavalry,  to 
co-operate  with  the  Rumanian  army  against  the  Bul- 
garians. These  were  sent,  but  they  proved  lamentably 
inadequate  to  stop  Mackensen's  unexpected  whirlwind 
offensive. 

The  Allies  thought  that  they  had  sufficiently  guaran- 
teed the  safety  of  Rumania's  southern  border  by  pro- 
mising an  offensive  out  of  the  Salonica  intrenched  camp. 
By  the  terms  of  the  treaty  it  was  to  begin  on  August 


Russia's  Collapse— Rumania       295 

20th,  eight  days  before  the  Rumanian  declaration  of 
war.  This  promise  was  fulfilled  only  to  the  extent  of 
an  announcement  by  the  French  War  Office  on  August 
2 1  st  to  the  effect  that  "on  August  20th  the  Allied  forces 
at  Salonica  took  the  offensive  on  the  entire  front." 

What  really  happened  was  that  the  Bulgarians, 
evidently  forewarned,  themselves  began  an  attack  on 
the  Salonica  front  on  August  18th.  They  gained 
considerable  ground.  On  Sarrail's  extreme  right  they 
took  the  Greek  port  of  Kavala,  occupied  by  troops 
loyal  to  the  Greek  Government,  with  which  Bulgaria 
was  not  at  war.  By  collusion  with  Constantine  these 
troops  were  sent  to  Germany  as  nominal  prisoners.  It 
was  not  until  September  1 8th  that  the  Sarrail  offensive 
— such  as  it  was — got  started.  By  November  19th  the 
Allied  left  wing  had  reached  Monastir,  just  across 
the  Serbian  border.  But  less  than  three  weeks  later 
Mackensen  was  in  Bucharest. 

True  to  its  old  failings,  Allied  strategy  clung  to  the 
theory  of  loosely  co-ordinated  attacks  on  various  fronts. 
German  strategy  adhered  to  the  principle  of  seeking  a 
decision  through  envelopment  on  a  single  front.  Pit- 
ting the  first  method  against  the  second,  the  outcome 
could  never  be  in  doubt. 

In  the  first  week  of  September  the  Rumanians  poured 
through  all  the  Transylvanian  passes,  moving  west  out 


296   The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

of  Moldavia  and  north  out  of  Wallachia.  The  Teuton 
forces  drew  back,  with  the  purpose  of  organizing  a 
counter-offensive.  Within  a  fortnight  about  a  quarter 
of  the  area  of  Transylvania  had  been  "redeemed." 
In  the  south-eastern  angle  of  the  province  the  Ruma- 
nians had  penetrated  to  a  depth  of  fifty  miles. 

But  the  farther  west  and  north  they  moved  the 
farther  they  got  away  from  the  Russians  and  from 
Sarrail.  And  while  the  Russians  and  Sarrail  were 
still  inactive  the  Teuton  armies  struck  at  the  isolated 
Rumanians  from  three  directions. 

The  Rumanian  campaign  was  Germany's  most 
finished  military  achievement.  It  far  outclassed  the 
Serbian  campaign  of  191 5,  for  Serbia  was  vastly  out- 
numbered, lacked  big  guns,  was  beyond  any  Allied 
assistance,  and  never  had  a  fighting  chance.  The 
Rumanians  were  hardly  inferior  in  numbers  and  the 
Russians  stood  only  a  few  marches  away.  Rumania's 
downfall  was  due  simply  to  a  brilliant  economy  of 
force  on  Germany's  part  and  a  lamentably  ineffective 
employment  of  it  on  the  part  of  the  Allies. 

The  chief  credit  for  the  Rumanian  envelopment 
goes  to  Mackensen.  He  was  in  command  in  Bulgaria. 
He  boldly  stripped  the  Macedonian  front,  ignoring  the 
threat  of  an  Allied  offensive  up  the  Vardar.  Gather- 
ing  together   some   German,   Bulgarian,  and   Turkish 


Russia's  Collapse— Rumania       297 

divisions,  be  invaded  the  Dobrudja  early  in  September. 
In  a  week  his  right  wing  had  reached  the  Black  Sea 
coast  south  of  Constanza,  his  centre  had  stormed 
Silistria  and  his  left  wing  taken  Turtukai.  The  fall  of 
these  two  last  fortresses  left  Rumania  with  no  bridge- 
heads on  the  Danube  south  and  south-east  of  Bucharest. 

Mackensen's  objective  was  the  railroad  from  Bucha- 
rest to  Constanza,  crossing  the  Danube  at  Cherna- 
voda.  If  this  were  cut,  the  Dobrudja  would  be  lost 
to  Rumania.  On  October  21st  the  Rumanian  and  Rus- 
sian forces  covering  the  railroad  line  were  defeated 
and  both  Chernavoda  and  Constanza  had  to  be  evacu- 
ated. General  Sakharov  was  sent  down  to  reorgan- 
ize the  Allied  armies  in  the  northern  neck  of  the 
Dobrudja.  But  he  eventually  retreated  across  the 
Danube  into  Moldavia. 

The  whole  southern  frontier  of  Rumania  was  now 
uncovered.  Falkenhayn  began  on  September  19th  to 
clear  the  northern  border.  He  enveloped  and  com- 
pletely routed  the  Rumanians  at  Hermannstadt,  in 
Transylvania,  north  of  the  Red  Tower  Pass.  Then 
he  trapped  another  Rumanian  army  near  Cronstadt. 
Coming  south  through  the  Red  Tower  Pass  Falken- 
hayn cut  the  railroad  from  the  Iron  Gates  to  Craiova 
and  isolated  the  Rumanian  forces  in  Western  Rumania. 
Avarescu,  the  Rumanian  commander-in-chief,  tried  to 


298    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

make  a  stand  on  the  line  of  the  Alt  River.  But  he 
was  immediately  outflanked  on  the  north  by  German 
troops  pushing  through  the  Torzburg  Pass  and  on  the 
south  by  a  force  which  Mackensen  sent  across  the 
Danube  toward  Alexandria. 

The  situation  in  Wallachia  now  became  hopeless. 
There  was  no  way  to  save  Bucharest  from  the  German 
armies  converging  toward  it  from  the  north,  west,  and 
south.  A  fortress  as  strong  as  Antwerp,  it  was  wisely 
abandoned  by  the  retreating  Rumanians,  without  a 
fight.  It  would  have  been  the  grave  of  an  army 
attempting  to  defend  it. 

Mackensen  entered  the  Rumanian  capital  on  Decem- 
ber 6th — 105  days  after  Rumania  had  declared  war 
on  Austria-Hungary.  But  he  didn't  tarry  long.  The 
pursuit  of  the  Rumanians,  reinforced  by  some  Russian 
infantry  and  cavalry,  continued  until  the  end  of  De- 
cember. All  Wallachia  was  cleared.  The  remnants  of 
the  Rumanian  armies  were  grouped  on  a  line  extend- 
ing east  and  west  from  Braila,  on  the  Danube,  to 
Fokshani,  near  the  junction  of  the  south-western 
Carpathians  with  the  Transylvanian  Alps.  Though 
both  Braila  and  Fokshani  were  taken  a  little  later  by 
the  Germans,  this  line  remained  practically  intact 
all  through  191 7  and  up  to  the  signing  of  the  Treaty 
of  Bucharest. 


Russia's  Collapse— Rumania       299 

Mackensen  had  won  a  series  of  sensational  victories 
at  a  very  slight  cost.  He  had  reduced  the  length  of 
the  German-Bulgarian  front  in  the  Balkans  from  nine 
hundred  miles  to  about  two  hundred.  He  had  opened 
many  new  lines  of  communication  with  Constanti- 
nople and  added  a  new  principality  of  more  than 
thirty  thousand  square  miles  to  German  Middle 
Europe.  Most  important  of  all,  he  had  annexed  a 
kingdom  almost  as  valuable  as  Hungary  as  a  producer 
of  foodstuffs. 

It  cannot  detract  from  Mackensen's  achievement 
that  Allied  generalship — or  lack  of  it — played  gener- 
ously into  his  hand.  He  banked  on  the  paralyzing 
effects  of  Allied  disunity  of  command.  But  he  seized 
his  opportunities  unerringly  and  exploited  them  to 
the  full. 

Rumania's  fate  was  pitiful.  She  had  a  right  to 
think  that  she  had  been  ruthlessly  sacrificed  to  the 
self-deceptions  of  Allied  policy.  About  the  time  that 
Chernavoda  fell,  Premier  Lloyd  George  was  saying  in 
the  British  House  of  Commons:  "We  and  our  Allies 
are  working  in  concert  and  everything  that  is  possible 
is  being  done  to  help  Rumania." 

What  bitter  irony!  Allied  statesmen  in  the  West 
were  still  victims  of  the  obsession  that  they  could  save 
Rumania  by  an  offensive  on  the  Somme.     "Everything 


300    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

that  is  possible ! ' '  With  Constantine  still  on  the  throne 
and  Sarrail  still  fighting  inside  Greek  territory! 

Many  Western  Allied  writers  have  tried  to  shoulder 
on  Russia  the  blame  for  Rumania's  downfall.  Russian 
military  aid  to  Rumania  was  certainly  disproportionate 
to  Russian  man  power.  But  that  was  not  altogether 
Russia's  fault.  She  had  yielded  to  the  urgings  of  Italy, 
France,  and  Great  Britain  when  she  advanced  the  date 
of  her  great  summer  offensive. 

Sturmer  and  Protopopoff  are  accused  of  having 
forced  Rumania  into  the  war  at  an  inopportune  mo- 
ment and  then  deserting  her.  These  two  reactionaries 
were  intriguing  for  peace  at  any  price  with  Germany. 
But  Russia  alone  could  not  compel  Rumania  to  draw 
the  sword.  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Italy,  all  signed 
the  treaty  of  alliance.  It  was  the  business  of  the  Allied 
Military  Council  to  know  whether  the  plan  of  strategy 
recommended  to  Rumania  was  sound  or  not,  and 
whether  the  promises  of  co-operation  held  out  were 
genuine  and  redeemable. 

Russia  actually  gave  Rumania  much  more  assistance 
than  the  international  compact  required  her  to  give. 
France,  Great  Britain,  and  Italy,  the  three  chief  contri- 
butors to  the  Salonica  army,  gave  no  assistance  which 
was  not  a  mockery.  If  the  Allied  Council  knew  that 
Sarrail   would   not   or   could   not   break   through   the 


Russia's  Collapse — Rumania       301 

southern  Bulgarian  barrier,  it  would  have  been  only- 
fair-dealing  on  its  part  to  insist  on  Rumania's  prolong- 
ing her  neutrality. 

The  Western  Allies  failed  entirely  to  grasp  the  situa- 
tion created  by  the  sacrifice  of  Rumania.  Their  states- 
men and  generals  were  living  in  a  world  of  unreality. 
What  had  happened  on  the  East  Front  in  191 5  and 
19 1 6,  was  still  a  riddle  to  them.  They  still  exaggerated 
Russia's  strength  and  underestimated  the  strength  of 
the  Teutonic  Powers. 

An  Inter-Allied  conference  was  held  at  Petrograd 
at  the  end  of  January,  191 7.  There  was  a  strate- 
gic commission  and  a  political  commission.  General 
Gourko,  who  presided  at  the  strategic  meetings,  tells 
how  he  endeavoured  to  get  permission  for  Premier 
Bratiano  of  Rumania  to  attend  the  political  confer- 
ences. Bratiano  was  finally  invited  to  one  meeting. 
The  representatives  of  the  major  Western  Powers  de- 
clined to  give  him  a  general  invitation  on  the  ground 
that  it  would  create  a  precedent,  compelling  the  next 
Inter-Ally  conference  to  receive  a  representative  from 
Belgium,  from  Portugal,  and  from  Serbia,  as  well  as 
from  Rumania.  As  if  it  was  not  also  Serbia's,  Rumania's, 
and  Belgium's  war! 

The  strategic  commission  had  a  harmonious  and 
successful  meeting.     Plans  for    191 7   were   drawn   up 


302    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

and  the  military  representatives  of  the  Western  Powers 
started  home,  without  the  least  suspicion  that  what  the 
Russian  General  Staff  promised  would  never  be  ful- 
filled by  the  Russian  armies  and  the  Russian  people. 
Only  three  or  four  weeks  after  the  Inter- Allied  confer- 
ence adjourned,  the  Czar  was  deposed  and  Russia  was 
in  revolution.  The  fiction  of  a  military  alliance  with 
the  Western  Entente  nations  was  to  be  maintained 
for  some  months  to  come.  But  the  Russian  military 
structure  had  lost  its  corner-stone.  And  the  political 
necessities  of  the  Revolution  were  to  turn  Russia 
quickly  from  a  friend  to  a  critic  of  Allied  policy — from 
a  militant  to  a  "  peace-at-any-price "  nation. 

Sturmer  and  Protopopoff  would  have  made  peace 
with  Germany  on  Germany's  terms  for  the  sake  of 
saving  the  Romanoff  dynasty.  After  destroying  the 
army,  the  Revolutionary  leaders  discovered  that  they 
had  to  go  to  Germany  hat  in  hand  in  order  to  save 
the  Revolution. 

Germany  didn't  directly  foment  the  Duma  revolt. 
She  would  have  preferred  to  do  business  with  the 
monarchy.  But  when  conditions  had  become  ripe 
for  the  Czar's  dethronement,  Russia's  days  as  an 
Entente  belligerent  were  numbered.  Civil  war  had 
finished  the  work  of  Hindenburg  and  Mackensen. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

GERMANY   CHALLENGES   AMERICA 

The  crisis  of  the  war  was  reached  in  the  winter  months 
of  191 7,  when  the  German  Government  suddenly 
decided  to  resume  unrestricted  submarine  warfare. 
This  decision  was  made  over  the  head  of  the  Chancel- 
lor and  the  German  Foreign  Office.  It  ran  counter  to 
the  military  policy  which  Hindenburg  had  been  pur- 
suing. It  represented  a  return  to  the  fatal  obsessions 
of  Tirpitz. 

The  Germans  had  nearly  won  the  war.  Rumania 
had  succumbed.  Russia  was  about  to  yield.  Ger- 
many had  become  master  of  Central  and  Eastern 
Europe.  But  at  the  moment  when  prudence  counselled 
her  to  secure  the  fruits  of  her  Eastern  conquests,  she 
turned  again  to  the  West  to  seek  new  quarrels  and  new 
enemies.  Germany  had  everything  to  gain  and  nothing 
to  lose  by  continuing  to  consolidate  her  Continental 
position.  She  had  little  to  gain  and  everything  to 
lose  by  venturing  on  a  campaign  of  piracy  on  the  high 
seas. 

303 


304    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Of  what  avail  was  it  to  put  the  Russian  colossus  out 
of  the  war  and  then  drag  in  the  United  States,  an  op- 
ponent ten  times  more  dangerous  than  Russia?  But 
Germany,  in  January,  191 7,  was  in  a  mood  to  defy 
prudence  and  scoff  at  reason.  In  that  mood  she  was 
willing  to  sacrifice  the  substance  of  victory  on  the 
continent  of  Europe  to  the  shadowy  dream  of  an 
empire  beyond  the  seas. 

The  history  of  the  crisis  is  still  obscure.  Hinden- 
burg's  appointment  in  the  summer  of  191 6  to  succeed 
Falkenhayn  had  seemed  to  put  the  "Easterners"  in 
control  of  the  situation. 

Hindenburg  looked  with  distrust  on  the  U-boat 
venture.  Bethmann-Hollweg  was  anxious  to  keep 
U-boat  activities  within  the  scope  of  maritime  law. 
All  through  191 6,  Germany  had  shown  an  inclination 
to  regard  the  so-called  submarine  blockade  of  French 
and  British  ports  as  a  relative  failure — a  failure  to 
such  an  extent,  at  least,  that  it  was  not  worth  while 
risking  war  with  the  United  States  for  the  sake  of 
continuing  it. 

In  the  Sussex  note  of  April  10,  1916,  and  the  addi- 
tional note  of  May  8,  191 6,  Jagow,  the  German  Secre- 
tary of  State  for  Foreign  Affairs,  gave  the  United 
States  assurances  that  "merchant  vessels,  both  within 
and  without  the  area  declared  as  naval  war  zones, 


Germany  Challenges  America      305 

shall  not  be  sunk  without  warning  and  without  saving 
human  lives,  unless  those  ships  attempt  to  escape  or 
offer  resistance." 

Jagow  expressly  reserved  the  right  to  withdraw 
these  assurances,  if  American  diplomatic  pressure  did 
not  move  Great  Britain  to  modify  the  rigours  of  the 
German  food  blockade.  But  it  was  reasonable  to  infer 
from  the  tone  of  the  note,  that  the  German  Govern- 
ment was  not  binding  itself  to  go  back  presently  to 
the  old  methods  as  a  matter  of  international  punctilio. 
The  United  States,  at  least,  accepted  the  view  that 
Germany  would  not  resume  indiscriminate  submarine 
warfare  unless  she  found  paying  military  reasons  for 
doing  so. 

The  period  of  truce  definitely  inaugurated  by  the 
Sussex  note,  continued  all  through  the  year.  Verdun 
and  the  Somme  had  sobered  the  Teuton  extremists. 
But  the  glittering  Rumanian  triumph  of  October  and 
November  went  to  Germany's  head.  Here  was  an- 
other supposed  proof  of  Teuton  invincibility.  A  new 
enemy  had  appeared  and  had  been  swiftly  vanquished. 
Should  the  fear  of  attracting  still  another  enemy  now 
deter  Germany  from  revenging  herself  on  Great  Britain 
for  the  discomforts  and  annoyances  of  food  rationing? 

Even  before  the  war  Germany  had  had  her  school 
of    Easterners    and    her    school    of   Westerners.     The 


306    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

former  held  that  Russia  was  the  real  rival  to  be  put 
out  of  the  way  and  that  the  objective  of  Germany's 
next  military  venture  must  be  the  Russian  border 
provinces.  The  latter,  composed  chiefly  of  the  naval 
clique,  the  mercantile  classes,  and  the  manufacturing 
magnates  of  the  Rhineland  and  Westphalia,  held,  on 
the  contrary,  that  as  the  result  of  the  next  war,  Belgium 
and  the  French  mineral  and  manufacturing  districts 
must  be  acquired  and  Great  Britain  forced  to  admit 
Germany  to  partnership  as  mistress  of  the  seas. 

These  last-named  powerful  interests  now  clamoured 
for  new  offensives  in  France  and  an  extension  of  sub- 
marine warfare.  They  had  been  kept  under  in  191 6. 
But  they  had  stimulated  the  building  of  new  and 
larger  U-boats.  And  when  German  self-esteem  was 
suddenly  inflated  by  Mackensen's  startling  victories  on 
the  Danube,  they  found  it  comparatively  easy  to  get 
a  hearing  once  more  in  the  highest  military  councils. 

The  winter  of  191 7  also  marked  the  rising  of  Luden- 
dorff's  star.  He  had  been  known  in  inner  military 
and  political  circles  as  the  real  creator  of  Hindenburg's 
reputation.  He  had  stood  in  the  shadow  for  two  years 
and  a  half.  Now  he  began  to  emerge  and  demand 
consideration  on  his  own  account.  Ludendorff's  as- 
sumption of  power  coincided  with  the  change  in  policy, 
which  brought  Germany  into  conflict  with  the  United 


Germany  Challenges  America      307 

States.  It  is  difficult,  therefore,  to  escape  the  conclu- 
sion that  he  associated  himself  deliberately  with  the 
elements  which  demanded  war  to  the  knife  against 
Allied  and  neutral  shipping,  however  this  relapse  into 
barbarism  might  affect  American  relations. 

Ludendorff  served  the  ends  of  the  U-boat  extremists 
and  they  served  his.  He  became  a  political  and  mili- 
tary dictator  and  remained  such  through  191 7  and 
1918.  He  made  and  unmade  chancellors  and  ministries. 
As  Chief  Quartermaster-General,  he  assumed  control 
of  industries,  transportation,  and  rationing.  He  abso- 
lutely controlled  the  press.  His  word  was  law  on  all 
questions  of  domestic  politics.  His  power  altogether 
eclipsed  the  Kaiser's.  Germany  obeyed  him  implicitly 
and  the  ruin  of  her  hopes  can  be  laid  at  no  other  man's 
door. 

After  the  war  Ludendorff  himself  attributed  German 
defeat  in  part  to  the  poor  work  of  the  Intelligence 
Bureau  of  the  War  Office.  The  Intelligence  Bureau 
probably  followed  the  established  German  custom  of 
telling  the  government  and  the  High  Command  what 
it  thought  they  wanted  to  hear.  But  its  poor  work 
could  not  excuse  a  decision  >  which,  it  was  plain,  would 
leave  America  no  alternative  but  war.  Whatever 
reports  came  from  German  agents  in  the  United  States, 
it  ought  to  have  been  manifest  to  any  competent  states- 


308    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

man  or  General  Staff  officer  in  Berlin  that  Germany 
must  choose  between  living  up  to  the  Sussex  note 
guarantees,  or  fighting  the  United  States. 

Germany  had  long  presumed  on  the  disinclination 
of  the  American  Government  to  abandon  a  sheltered 
and  profitable  role  of  neutrality.  The  Lusitania  nego- 
tiations had  unavoidably  created  the  impression  in 
Europe  that  the  United  States  would  go  to  very  great 
lengths,  in  order  to  keep  out  of  the  conflict. 

The  note  of  February  10,  19 15,  in  response  to  the 
German  "war  zone"  proclamation,  was  a  brusque 
affirmation  of  normal  American  policy.  It  gave  notice 
that  the  government  at  Washington  would  hold  Ger- 
many to  "strict  accountability"  for  the  destruction  of 
an  American  vessel  or  the  lives  of  American  citizens. 
It  announced  that  the  United  States  would  take  any 
steps  necessary  "to  safeguard  American  lives  and 
property  and  to  secure  to  American  citizens  the  full 
enjoyment  of  their  acknowledged  rights  on  the  high 
seas." 

This  note  was  apparently  written  in  the  lively  con- 
fidence that  Germany,  in  her  own  interest,  would  avoid 
murdering  American  citizens  travelling  on  Allied  or 
neutral  merchant  ships.  The  Lusitania  tragedy  dis- 
pelled that  hope.  And  when  the  American  Govern- 
ment  not    only  failed   to  hold   Germany   to   "strict 


Germany  Challenges  America      309 

accountability"  for  the  massacre  of  American  passen- 
gers on  the  Lusitania,  but  also  declined  to  make  the 
military  preparations  necessary  to  enforce  the  policy 
outlined  in  the  note  of  February  10th,  Germany  may 
naturally  have  jumped  to  the  conclusion  that  the 
United  States  was  much  more  concerned  about  pre- 
serving her  own  neutrality  than  she  was  about  main- 
taining neutral  rights  at  sea. 

Superficially,  at  least,  this  conclusion  may  have  been 
justified  by  the  correspondence  in  the  Lusitania  case. 
In  that  the  contentions  of  the  note  of  February  10th 
were  never  satisfied.  But  it  became  more  and  more 
difficult  to  waive  satisfaction  of  them  in  later  cases. 
Many  powerful  elements  in  the  United  States  never 
concurred  in  the  Government's  solicitous  pro-peace 
views.  And  their  protests  began  to  modify  the 
Administration's  attitude. 

While  the  Lusitania  negotiations  were  still  in  progress 
the  White  Star  liner  Arabic  was  torpedoed  off  the  Irish 
coast  and  two  American  passengers  were  lost.  In  order 
to  allay  American  irritation  and  also  to  strengthen  its 
own  arguments  in  the  Lusitania  controversy  (for  the 
Arabic  was  west  bound  and  could  not  be  carrying 
munitions  or  other  contraband),  Germany  now  recog- 
nized the  advisability  of  seeking  a  modus  vivendi.  On 
September  1st  Count  Bernstorff  delivered  his  famous 


3io    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

memorandum    to    the   American    State    Department. 
One  paragraph  of  it  read: 

Liners  will  not  be  sunk  by  our  submarines  without 
warning  and  without  safety  of  the  lives  of  non- 
combatants,  provided  that  the  liners  do  not  try  to 
escape  or  offer  resistance. 

The  use  of  the  word  "liners"  showed  that  the  guar- 
antee was  limited  to  one  class  of  merchant  vessels. 
But  the  German  memorandum  involved  a  partial  re- 
cognition of  American  claims.  This  recognition  may 
have  been  little  more  than  a  temporizing  makeshift 
on  Germany's  part.  Between  August,  191 5,  when  the 
Arabic  was  destroyed,  and  March  24,  1916,  when  the 
passenger  steamer  Sussex  was  torpedoed  in  the  English 
Channel,  there  were  various  instances  of  illegal  sub- 
marine attack.  Yet  German  diplomacy  was  growing 
more  and  more  cautious.  The  much  stiffer  tone  of 
the  American  protest  in  the  Sussex  case  and  the 
increasing  agitation  in  the  United  States  for  military 
preparedness  led  Berlin  to  admit  having  violated 
its  earlier  assurances  and  even  to  enlarge  the  Arabic 
pledge  so  as  to  include  merchant  shipping  of  every 
description. 

The  American  Government  had  threatened  to  break 
off  diplomatic  relations  unless  Germany  abandoned 
her  illegal  methods  of  submarine  warfare.     Berlin  had 


Germany  Challenges  America     311 

yielded  to  that  threat.  So,  on  the  face  of  the  record, 
Germany  could  not  hope,  in  191 7,  to  draw  new  "war 
zones"  about  Great  Britain,  Ireland,  France,  and  Italy, 
and  sink  on  sight  enemy  or  neutral  shipping  entering 
them,  without  adding  the  United  States  to  her  already 
long  list  of  enemies. 

What  induced  Germany — beyond  mere  mass  hysteria 
— to  brave  war  with  the  United  States  by  unleashing 
the  submarine?  A  ruthless  U-boat  campaign  un- 
doubtedly appealed  to  the  politicians  and  the  public 
as  a  short-cut  to  peace.  But  the  military  leaders  were 
obliged  to  give  at  least  casual  consideration  to  the 
question  whether  it  would  not  prove  instead  a  short- 
cut to  defeat. 

Assuming  that  the  decision  was  primarily  a  military 
one,  there  is  only  one  rational  explanation  of  it.  That 
is  that  the  German  General  Staff  absolutely  discounted 
American  military  power.  Its  technical  experts  as- 
sured the  German  public  again  and  again  that  America 
could  not  raise  and  train  armies,  within  two  years, 
and  that  even  if  she  did  raise  and  train  them  within 
that  time,  she  could  never  get  them  across  the  Atlantic. 
Had  these  two  assumptions  held  good,  the  German 
High  Command  could  eventually  have  justified  its 
challenge  to  the  United  States.  For  America  would 
have  entered  the  war  only  on  the  economic  side,  and 


312    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

she  was  already  to  a  large  extent  an  Allied  munitions 
maker  and  money  lender. 

But  the  German  military  leaders  didn't  realize,  in 
making  the  momentous  decision  of  January,  191 7, 
that  they  were  basing  their  strategy  not  on  experience 
but  on  hypothesis.  They  were  banking  on  the  favour- 
able operation  of  circumstances  largely  beyond  their 
control.  Whether  America  would  turn  out  one,  two, 
or  four  million  well-trained  troops  was  a  matter  for 
her  alone  to  decide.  She  could  do  it,  if  she  wanted 
to  do  it.  Whether  she  could  deliver  one,  two,  or  four 
million  troops  in  France  was  a  matter  for  her  and  her 
European  Allies  to  determine.  It  was  only  a  question 
of  getting  the  tonnage.  Germany's  sole  power  to  in- 
tervene lay  in  the  U-boat,  whose  capacity  to  "block- 
ade" the  French  and  British  coasts  and  to  drive  enemy 
and  neutral  shipping  out  of  the  North  Atlantic 
lanes  had  not  yet  been  demonstrated,  or  even  more 
than  casually  indicated.  From  the  German  point  of 
view  war  with  the  United  States  was  to  figure  as  a 
minor  incident  of  the  great  U-boat  campaign.  But, 
as  it  turned  out,  the  great  U-boat  campaign  really 
figured  as  a  minor  incident  in  the  war  with  the  United 
States. 

The  new  German  submarine  raiders  lived  up  to 
expectations  for  about  six  months.      They  showed  an 


Germany  Challenges  America      3l3 

alarming  ability  to  destroy  enemy  and  neutral  shipping 
faster  than  it  could  be  replaced  by  new  construction. 
But  the  peak  of  destructiveness  was  reached  much 
too  soon.  Before  the  bulk  of  the  American  Expedi- 
tionary Army  was  ready  to  be  dispatched  across  the 
Atlantic,  the  submarine  was,  in  a  military  sense,  a 
confessed  failure.  German  U-boats  could  not  stop 
American  transports.  Nor,  after  October,  19 17,  was 
there  any  prospect  of  their  reducing  Allied  and  neutral 
cargo-carrier  tonnage  below  the  safety  point. 

Against  these  trivial  credits  must  be  set  the  enor- 
mous debits  of  the  U-boat  campaign.  The  accession 
of  the  United  States  to  the  Entente  many  times  over- 
balanced the  retirement  of  Russia.  It  allayed  all  the 
financial  worries  of  the  Allied  governments.  It  greatly 
restored  French  morale  in  the  critical  year  191 7.  It 
presented  a  clear  guarantee  of  victory  to  the  Allies, 
if  they  could  only  hold  out  until  1919.  Even  in  1918, 
America  furnished  Foch  with  the  "strategic  reserve" 
which  enabled  him  to  start  his  "Victory  Offensive." 
She  supplied  him  with  the  six  hundred  thousand  men 
who  cleared  the  west  bank  of  the  Meuse  from  Verdun 
to  Sedan  and  cut  the  communications  between  Luden- 
dorff's  southern  and  the  northern  army  groups.  "The 
Americans  can  never  arrive,"  said  the  complacent 
War  Lords  and  Intelligence  Bureau  experts  in  Berlin. 


3H    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

By  the  time  Germany  was  ready  to  solicit  an  armistice 
the  American  forces  in  France  actually  outnumbered 
the  British  forces  there. 

Look  also  at  the  situation  which  would  have  de- 
veloped had  Germany  had  intelligence  enough  to  hold 
the  activities  of  her  U-boats  within  legal  bounds. 
The  new  "blockade  zone"  proclamation  was  issued 
on  January  31,  191 7.  Diplomatic  relations  with  the 
United  States  were  broken  off  on  February  3d.  The 
United  States  declared  war  on  April  6th.  But  already 
in  March  the  Czar  had  been  dethroned  and  Russia  had 
practically  ceased  to  function  as  a  belligerent.  After 
March,  191 7,  Germany  had  only  to  await  the  psychologi- 
cal moment  for  appropriating  the  lion's  share  of  the 
Romanoff  inheritance. 

Russia's  withdrawal  from  the  war  after  the  Czar's 
downfall  was  inevitable,  and  was  speedily  indicated. 
The  Revolution  was,  on  the  surface,  the  work  of  the 
politicians  of  the  Duma.  Yet  the  Duma  was,  in  reality, 
politically  weaker  than  the  Czar  was.  It  represented 
the  masses  less  than  he  did.  It  never  obtained  the 
support  of  the  army.  Instead,  the  army  and  the  work- 
men began  organizing  a  system  of  committee  govern- 
ment of  their  own,  to  whose  multifarious  whims  the 
Duma  and  the  provisional  government,  which  it  had 
set  up,  became  slavishly  subject. 


Germany  Challenges  America      3*5 

The  first  urge  of  the  new  freedom  was  toward  de- 
mobilization and  peace.  Both  the  original  Duma  and 
the  modified  Kerensky  governments  yielded  more  or 
less  consciously  to  that  urge  by  pleading  for  a  restate- 
ment of  the  Entente's  war  aims.  Kerensky,  as  a 
socialist  of  the  international  school,  felt  compelled  to 
advocate  indirect  negotiations  with  Germany  through 
the  medium  of  international  socialist  conferences  of 
the  pacifist  and  pro-German  kind  so  frequently  called 
to  meet  in  Stockholm.  Thus  he  quickly  brought  Revo- 
lutionary Russia  into  conflict  with  the  war  policies 
of  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Italy.  He  renounced 
Russian  claims  on  Constantinople,  and  publicly  em- 
braced the  principle  of  "no  annexations  and  no 
indemnities." 

Kerensky  was  nationalistic  and  anti-German,  how- 
ever. And,  unlike  Lenine  and  Trotzky,  he  was  un- 
purchasable.  He  favoured  a  continuance  of  the  war 
for  the  purpose  of  recovering  the  Russian  territory  still 
in  the  hands  of  the  Germans.  But  he  didn't  understand 
making  war.  His  schemes  for  democratizing  the  army 
quickly  destroyed  its  discipline  and  fighting  power. 

Kerensky  approved  the  spasmodic  Korniloff  offen- 
sive of  July,  191 7,  and  even  went  to  the  front  to 
harangue  the  troops  selected  to  take  part  in  it.  The 
Russian  army  was  better  munitioned  in  the  summer  of 


316    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

191 7  than  it  had  been  at  any  time  since  August,  1914. 
Korniloff  had  some  success  at  first  on  the  Galician 
front,  where  he  had  only  second  and  third  class  Austro- 
Hungarian  troops  to  deal  with.  But  his  attack  had 
hardly  got  under  way  before  it  collapsed.  Several 
Russian  divisions  mutinied  and  retreated.  German 
reinforcements  arrived,  restored  the  Austro-Hungarian 
lines,  and  then  drove  the  demoralized  Russians  out  of 
Galicia  and  Bukowina. 

By  August  1,  191 7,  the  Russian  armies  had  practi- 
cally ceased  to  exist  as  armies.  They  were  only  mobs  in 
uniform  awaiting  the  signal  to  demobilize.  Hundreds 
of  thousands  of  soldiers  deserted,  finding  the  process 
of  demobilization  too  slow  for  them.  There  was  no  sec- 
tor of  the  whole  front  which  the  Germans  and  Austro- 
Hungarians  could  not  now  penetrate  at  will.  The 
Germans  had  been  unable  to  take  Riga  in  1915  or  in 
191 6.  But  in  September,  191 7,  it  fell  to  them  at  a 
trifling  cost.  General  Letchitsky  could  make  only  a 
nominal  defence.  The  German  fleet  then  lent  a  hand 
in  capturing  the  islands  in  the  Gulf  of  Riga,  thus  open- 
ing the  way  to  Reval.  Had  the  German  High  Com- 
mand wanted  to  do  so,  it  could  easily  have  taken  Reval 
and  Petrograd  in  the  fall  of  191 7.  It  could  have  gone 
to  Moscow,  too,  if  it  hadn't  preferred  to  turn  west  and 
overwhelm  the  Italians  at  Caporetto. 


Germany  Challenges  America      3l7 

From  March,  191 7,  on,  Germany  was  free  to  impose 
her  will  on  Russia.  It  was  only  a  question  of  time  and 
method.  If  Ludendorff  had  not  mortgaged  the  future 
by  challenging  the  United  States,  he  would  have  had 
an  indefinite  period — two  years,  three  years,  or  until 
the  end  of  the  war — in  which  to  organize  the  military 
resources  of  Russia  against  the  Entente.  Napoleon 
turned  Poland  into  a  recruiting  camp.  Why  should 
Germany  not  have  tried  to  exploit  in  like  manner  the 
man  power  of  Poland,  Finland,  the  Baltic  Provinces, 
Lithuania,  and  the  Ukraine? 

But  America's  entry  into  the  war  materially  short- 
ened Germany's  period  of  grace  in  the  East.  The 
Muscovite  oyster  had  to  be  opened  and  eaten  quickly. 
Freedom  of  action  in  Russia  was  guaranteed  through 
1917;  for  Ludendorff  knew  that  he  could  easily  hold 
the  French  and  British  with  the  forces  he  had  on 
the  Western  Front.  Freedom  of  action  might  also  be 
guaranteed  for  a  part  of  191 8.  But  beyond  that 
point  nothing  was  clear. 

Two  ways  of  approach  to  the  Eastern  problem  were 
open  to  Germany.  The  first  was  to  attack  in  force  in 
the  summer  and  fall  of  191 7  and  extort  a  peace  from  a 
Russian  Government  still  partly  bourgeois  in  character, 
fearful  of  the  revolutionary  terrorists,  and  glad  to 
sustain  itself  through  a  German  alliance.     This  course 


3i  8    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

would  have  involved  military  intervention  on  behalf 
of  Kerensky  against  the  Bolshevists  or  on  behalf  of 
Korniloff  against  Kerensky.  It  would  have  duplicated 
Germany's  policy  in  Finland  in  supporting  Manner- 
heim  against  the  Reds.  Possibly  it  would  have  in- 
volved a  little  greater  military  effort.  But  the  results 
would  have  been  worth  while;  for  Germany  would 
have  won  that  same  credit  in  Russia  generally  as  she 
won  in  Finland  as  the  deliverer  of  the  non-proletarian 
element  from  the  tyranny  of  a  proletariat  dictatorship. 
A  German  protectorate  might  have  been  accepted 
with  a  certain  measure  of  gratitude  because  of  its 
political  and  economic  benefits. 

The  alternative  course  was  to  stand  off  and  let  the 
poison  of  the  Revolution  do  its  work.  This  policy, 
which  Ludendorff  adopted,  allowed  him  to  denude  the 
Eastern  Front.  But  it  wasted  precious  time.  Ger- 
many undoubtedly  accelerated  the  Bolshevist  counter- 
revolution. Lenine  and  Trotzky  may  or  may  not 
have  been  on  the  German  payroll.  Their  personal 
interests  coincided  with  Germany's  interests.  They 
were  willing  to  pay  almost  any  price  for  the  opportu- 
nity to  try  out  their  theory  of  Ghengis  Khanism,  dis- 
guised as  Marxian  justice — of  military  terrorism 
camouflaged  as  socialistic  democracy. 

Sitting  tight  on  the  East  Front  for  a  year,  while 


Germany  Challenges  America      3J9 

fomenting  the  Bolshevist  infection,  would  have  brought 
Germany  no  ill  results,  if  America  had  not  been  all 
the  while  preparing.  Even  before  the  treaties  of  Brest- 
Litovsk  and  Bucharest  had  been  signed,  American 
reinforcements  were  arriving  in  France.  Germany 
had  thus  lost  twelve  golden  months,  if  her  military 
leaders  ever  had  it  in  their  minds  to  fill  up  their  wan- 
ing divisions  with  Poles,  Lithuanians,  Finns,  Ests, 
and  Ukrainians,  just  as  Napoleon  the  First  filled  up 
his  with  Italians,  Spaniards,  Netherlanders,  Poles, 
Westphalians,  Saxons,  Rhinelanders,  and  South 
Germans. 

Ludendorff  thought  it  cheaper  to  use  chicanery  in 
dealing  with  Revolutionary  Russia  than  to  use  force. 
'  In  order  to  encourage  the  anti-Ally  revolutionary 
leaders  and  to  tempt  the  Petrograd  government  and 
the  peoples  of  the  border  provinces  into  seeking  peace, 
the  German  Reichstag  had  passed,  on  July  19,  191 7, 
a  hypocritical  resolution,  declaring  its  opposition  to 
any  "forced  annexations"  of  territory.  This  was  a 
crafty  echo  of  the  Kerensky  programme  of  "no  annexa- 
tions and  no  indemnities."  When  Germany  and 
Austria-Hungary  finally  got  ready  to  meet  Russia 
at  the  peace  table,  they  sought  to  attract  representa- 
tives of  the  other  Allied  Powers  to  Brest-Litovsk  by 
announcing,  through  Count  Czernin,  that  they  actu- 


320    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

ally  favoured  "no  annexations  and  no  indemnities" 
and  also  the  right  of  "self-determination  for  subject 
peoples." 

Lenine  and  Trotzky  probably  knew  how  worthless 
these  protestations  were.  The  Russian  border  peoples 
had  no  means  of  knowing.  When,  therefore,  General 
Hoffmann  brutally  raised  the  German  mask  at  the  peace 
conference,  these  peoples  realized  that  they  had  been 
made  the  victims  of  German  perfidy.  Expecting 
national  independence,  they  were  put  off  with  the  barest 
and  emptiest  symbols  of  it.  They  accepted  the  Teuton 
yoke,  cynically  camouflaged  as  "self-determination." 
There  was  nothing  else  for  them  to  do.  But  they 
accepted  it — all  of  them  but  Finland — with  sullen 
disappointment. 

The  Germans  did  Finland  a  real  service  by  crushing 
the  Bolshevist  Finnish  army  and  restoring  order.  Had 
America  been  kept  out  of  the  war,  Finnish  divisions 
would  eventually  have  fought  in  LudendorfTs  western 
armies.  So  might  Lithuanian,  Baltic  Province,  Pol- 
ish, and  Ukrainian  divisions,  if  Ludendorff  had  only 
torn  up  the  fatal  war  zone  Admiralty  proclamation  of 
January  31,  191 7. 

In  fact,  there  is  little  reason  to  doubt  that  Germany 
would  have  made  her  Western  Front  impregnable, 
through  eastern  help,  if  she  had  only  had  the  sagacity, 


Germany  Challenges  America      321 

after  once  deciding  to  drop  illegitimate  U-boat  activi- 
ties, to  stick  to  that  decision  to  the  end. 

As  it  was,  her  strategy  on  both  fronts  in  191 7  was 
hampered  by  an  uneasy  consciousness  that  the  U-boat 
had  failed  or  was  about  to  fail.  She  didn't  strike 
resolutely  against  Russia.  Nor  did  she  venture  to 
transfer  her  eastern  divisions  west  for  the  purpose  of 
striking  resolutely  against  Great  Britain  and  France. 
The  forces  which  were  used  by  Hutier  in  September  and 
October  to  take  Riga — a  perfectly  superfluous  effort 
at  that  date — could  at  least  have  been  employed  more 
profitably  to  break  the  lines  of  the  Salonica  entrenched 
camp,  thus  loosening  the  last  foothold  of  the  Allies 
on  the  Balkan  Peninsula.  Obviously  the  blow  which 
the  Italian  armies  could  not  parry  on  the  Isonzo, 
could  not  have  been  parried  by  the  much  weaker 
Allied  armies  in  Macedonia. 
f  The  Hindenburg  strategical  retirement  out  of  the 
Noyon  salient  had  been  planned  before  the  U-boat 
decision  was  made.  It  was  about  the  last  flash  of  real 
military  inspiration  at  German  Grand  Headquarters. 
After  that  comes  the  long  Ludendorff  regime  of  inde- 
cision and  bluster,  of  vacillation  here  and  reckless 
plunges  there,  of  the  generalship  of  the  gambling  table. 
According  to  the  calculations  of  the  men  who  ordered 
the  resumption  of  indiscriminate  submarine  warfare, 


322    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

America  would  never  fight  in  France.  According  to  Gen- 
eral Hoffmann,  the  dictator  at  Brest-Litovsk,  Luden- 
dorff  telephoned  him,  in  February,  191 8,  to  "sign  a 
peace — any  peace — with  any  Russian  who  can  write 
his  name."  Hoffmann  quotes  Ludendorff  as  adding: 
"The  Americans  are  coming,  and  we  need  every  corps 
we  have  on  the  Western  Front.  Make  peace  with 
Russia  and  release  our  armies  there  at  once." 

In  February,  1918,  there  were  no  first-class,  and 
comparatively  few  second  class,  German  troops  left 
on  the  Eastern  Front.  But  what  is  to  be  thought  of 
a  strategy  which  did  not  appreciate  until  February, 
19 1 8,  the  importance  of  the  time  relation  between 
peace  in  Russia  and  the  arrival  of  the  American  rein- 
forcement in  France  and  was  astonished  to  discover 
that  the  latter  was  appearing  too  soon  and  the  former 
had  come  too  late? 

Germany's  challenge  to  the  United  States  in  January, 
191 7,  remains,  from  the  military  point  of  view,  the 
most  inexplicable  mystery  of  the  war.  It  was  not  war. 
It  was  madness.  It  eclipsed  the  first  Napoleon's  mad- 
nesses— the  march  to  Moscow  or  the  harebrained  effort 
to  seat  Joseph  on  the  throne  of  Spain.  It  was  worthy 
of  a  poseur  strategist,  like  William  II.  It  was  one  of 
those  caprices  of  judgment  of  which  destiny  loves  to 
make  men  and  nations  the  sport.     The  U-boat  pro- 


Germany  Challenges  America      323 

clamation  was  the  death  warrant  of  Teutonism.  It 
ended  the  German  dream  of  world  empire.  No  Ger- 
man is  ever  likely  to  admit  direct  responsibility  for  it. 
His  own  people  would  stone  him.  But  civilization 
would  owe  him  a  monument. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

THE   WEST   FRONT   IN    I917 — CAMBFAI 

Military  operations  slowed  down  considerably  in 
191 7.  The  year  191 6  had  seen  Verdun,  the  Somme, 
the  Brusiloff  offensive,  and  the  conquest  of  Rumania. 
The  Teuton  allies  attempted  only  one  major  offen- 
sive in  191 7 — that  against  Italy.  On  the  West  Front 
the  French  and  British  confined  themselves,  in  the 
main,  to  carefully  localized  attacks.  Allenby  captured 
Jerusalem  near  the  close  of  the  year. 

The  reason  for  this  comparative  relaxation  of  activi- 
ties has  already  been  indicated.  The  year  191 7  was  a 
period  of  readjustment.  The  entry  of  America  into 
the  war  had  affected  both  Allied  and  German  mili- 
tary policy.  Germany  had  her  eyes  on  the  sea, 
watching  nervously  for  the  accomplishment  of  the 
miracle  promised  by  the  partisans  of  unrestricted  U-boat 
warfare.  The  French  and  the  British  in  the  West, 
particularly  the  French,  wisely  economized  their  strength 
while  awaiting  the  coming  of  the  American  reinforce- 
ment. !  Up  to  1917,  it  was  to  Germany's  interest  to 

324 


The  West  Front  in  1917— Cambrai  325 

fight  a  delaying  battle  in  the  West.  Now  delay  served 
the  purposes  of  the  Allies. 

German  policy  fell  between  two  stools.  The  logical 
accompaniment  of  the  renewal  of  submarine  piracy 
would  have  been  a  speeding-up  of  the  attack — first 
on  the  East  Front  and  then  on  the  West  Front.  But 
Germany  unwisely  delayed  forcing  a  peace  on  Russia. 
Hindenburg's  plans  for  a  permanent  defensive  in  the 
West  had  only  matured  in  the  winter  and  spring  of 
191 7.  It  was  difficult  to  change  them.  The  colossal 
Hindenburg  Line  had  been  constructed  as  a  barrier 
which  could  be  easily  and  economically  held.  Even 
after  the  U-boat's  inability  to  stop  the  flow  of  American 
troops  to  Europe  had  become  patent,  Germany  still 
required  months  to  shift  in  the  West  from  a  defensive 
basis  to  an  offensive  basis.  Ludendorff  was,  in  fact, 
unable  to  organize  his  attack  on  the  French  and  British 
until  March,  191 8.  The  best  he  could  do  in  the  fall  of 
191 7  was  to  go  south  and  deal  a  staggering  blow  to 
Italy. 

The  first  British  operation  in  the  West  was  the  battle 
of  Arras.  This  was  in  purpose  and  method  a  continua- 
tion of  the  battle  of  the  Somme.  It  was  a  military 
success  only  in  so  far  as  it  compelled  an  extension  to 
the  north  of  the  retirement  which  Hindenburg  had 
already  effected  out  of  the  Noyon  salient. 


326   The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

The  German  withdrawal  had  not  affected  the  front 
from  Arras  to  Lens.  The  new  enemy  line  joined  the 
old  one  at  a  point  just  below  Arras.  The  result  of  two 
months  of  fighting  was  to  push  the  Germans  back 
about  five  miles  east  of  Arras  and  to  put  Lens  into  a 
dangerous  pocket.  The  British  won  some  valuable 
positions.  But  in  the  main  the  operation  was  only 
another  experiment  in  attrition. 

The  battle  began  on  Easter  Monday,  April  9th.  On 
that  day  Canadian  troops  took  Vimy  Ridge — one  of 
the  chief  objectives  of  the  battle  of  Artois,  fought  two 
years  before.  On  succeeding  days  the  British  pene- 
trated the  entire  original  German  defence  system  be- 
tween Arras  and  Lens  and  forced  the  enemy  as  far  east 
as  the  so-called  Oppy  switch  line,  an  alternative  system, 
cutting  north  from  the  Hindenburg  line  in  the  neigh- 
bourhood of  Croisilles.  Still  farther  back  was  a  third 
system,  leaving  the  Hindenburg  Line  at  Queant  and 
terminating  at  Drocourt. 

In  the  first  week  of  the  battle  the  British  had  been 
uniformly  successful.  They  had  captured  about  fifteen 
thousand  prisoners  and  two  hundred  guns.  The  power 
of  the  offensive  to  break  through  the  fore  zone  of  the 
modified  German  defence  system  was  clearly  established. 
But  a  new  obstacle  was  now  encountered.  That  was 
the  counter-attack   after   the   break-through.     From 


The  West  Front  in  1917— Cambrai  327 

April  23d  to  the  beginning  of  June  the  British  armies 
struggled  in  vain  to  make  any  substantial  impression 
on  the  Oppy  switch  line,  because  every  slight  advance 
was  met  with  a  German  counter-attack.  Thus  the 
old  trench  deadlock  was  perpetuated  in  a  new  form. 
It  was  Verdun  over  again.  Farms,  villages,  clumps  of 
woods,  or  hill  slopes  were  taken  and  retaken  many 
times.  It  was  a  grinding  process,  as  exhausting  for 
the  defensive  as  for  the  offensive.  That  is  the  most 
that  can  be  said  of  the  bloody  struggles  east  and  south- 
east of  Arras.  They  served  no  broad,  strategic  purpose 
and  Sir  Douglas  Haig  finally  broke  them  off,  shifting 
his  attack  north  to  Flanders. 

One  lasting  result  had  been  achieved,  however. 
Possession  of  Vimy  Ridge  made  the  Allied  front  in  the 
Arras-Lens  sector  secure.  When  the  great  German 
irruption  came  in  the  spring  of  191 8,  it  overflowed  all 
the  territory  to  the  south  of  Arras,  which  had  been 
yielded  to  the  Allies  in  the  Somme  fighting  and  through 
Hindenburg's  retirement.  It  spread,  north  of  Lens,  far 
up  the  Lys  Valley  toward  Hazebrouck.  But  it  beat 
harmlessly  against  the  Lens-Arras  barrier.  And  so 
long  as  this  held  Ludendorff  lacked  the  "elbow  room" 
to  develop  his  attack  down  the  Somme  toward  Amiens 
or  up  the  Lys  Valley  toward  Calais. 

From  June  to  December  British  effort  in  the  West 


328    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

was  concentrated  on  the  front  about  Ypres.  The 
length  and  persistence  of  this  offensive  suggested  a 
real  strategical  objective.  It  may  have  been  the  hope 
of  the  British  High  Command  to  reach  Roulers  and 
Lille  and  to  compel  the  Germans  to  abandon  the  Bel- 
gian North  Sea  coast,  with  the  submarine  bases  of 
Bruges,  Ostend,  and  Zeebrugge.  A  similar  operation, 
in  the  fall  of  191 8,  quickly  attained  all  these  objectives. 
But  the  German  defence  in  191 7  was  as  adequate  in 
Flanders  as  it  was  in  Artois  or  on  the  Aisne.  It  could 
not  prevent  local  Allied  gains.  But  it  could  keep  them 
within  almost  negligible  limits. 

The  first  British  exploit  was  the  capture  of  Messines 
Ridge,  south-east  of  Ypres.  The  British  had  held  on 
to  Ypres  since  191 4,  although  it  lay  on  low  ground, 
commanded  by  the  German  batteries  on  the  heights 
surrounding  the  city  to  the  north-east,  east,  and  south- 
east. As  it  stood  in  191 7,  the  Ypres  salient  was  almost 
impossible  to  defend  against  a  serious  German  attack. 
It  was  desirable  to  enlarge  and  strengthen  it,  apart 
from  any  designs  on  Lille  or  the  Belgian  coast.  The 
Messines  operation  began  and  ended  the  same  day — 
June  7th.  It  was  executed  with  remarkable  precision. 
The  ridge  was  taken  at  slight  cost,  the  number  of  prison- 
ers captured — seven  thousand — almost  equalling  the 
total  British  casualties.     Messines,  although  an  isolated 


The  West  Front  in  1917— Cambrai  329 

and  minor  engagement,  demonstrated  more  strikingly 
than  ever  the  growing  power,  freedom,  and  economic 
value  of  the  offensive. 

Encouraged  by  their  easy  success  at  Messines  the 
Allies  undertook  a  series  of  similar  attacks  in  Flanders, 
which  lasted  from  July  31st  until  the  winter  rains  set 
in.  These  operations  gradually  cleared  the  heights 
east  of  Ypres  and  recovered  the  ground  north  of  the 
city  which  was  lost  in  the  German  "gas"  attack  of 
April,  191 5.  They  carried  the  eastern  bulge  of  the 
Ypres  salient  beyond  the  Messines  and  Passchendaele 
ridges,  bringing  Menin  and  Roulers  under  Allied 
artillery  fire. 

But  in  any  wide  strategic  view  these  results  were 
nearly  valueless.  The  railroad  artery  from  Menin  to 
Roulers  and  thence  north  to  the  Belgian  coast  district, 
was  not  cut.  Nor  did  the  ridges  won  serve,  like  Vimy 
Ridge,  as  a  bulwark  against  a  new  German  irruption. 
In  the  spring  of  191 8  the  Messines  heights  were  stormed 
by  the  Germans  early  in  the  course  of  the  Lys  Valley 
offensive.  The  Passchendaele  heights  had  to  be  evacu- 
ated without  a  battle.  The  sweeping  eastern  curve  of 
the  salient  became  a  straight  line,  skirting  the  eastern 
edge  of  Ypres.  Ypres  itself  was  only  saved  by  Arnim's 
severe  defeat  on  April  29,  19 18,  south-west  of  the  city. 

In  the  Flanders  battles  the  German  open  defence  had 


33°    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

one  of  its  severest  tests.  The  "pill  box"  fore  zone 
seldom  held  the  Allied  attack.  But  it  wasn't  intended 
to  do  that.  The  Allies  got  through  the  front  line  with 
great  regularity.  But  they  never  passed  the  mid 
zone.  They  never  accomplished  anything  like  a  real 
break-through.  The  best  evidence  of  this  is  the  fact 
that  after  three  months  of  hard  pounding  the  Germans 
had  been  thrown  back  only  three  or  four  miles  on  an 
average  and  still  barred  the  way  to  Roulers  and  Lille. 
In  Flanders,  as  on  the  Arras  front,  the  war  remained 
essentially  a  war  of  attrition  and  deadlock. 

The  French  began  an  offensive  on  the  Aisne  front  a 
week  after  the  British  opened  the  battle  of  Arras. 
The  attack  was  made  over  exceedingly  difficult  ground. 
The  battle  line  ran  from  a  point  north  of  Soissons  to 
a  point  north  of  Rheims — a  stretch  of  twenty-five 
miles.  The  objective  of  the  French  was  the  Chemin 
des  Dames — the  famous  road  constructed  by  Louis  XV, 
which  crowns  the  commanding  east  and  west  ridge 
separating  the  Aisne  Valley  from  the  Ailette  Valley. 

The  French  also  scored  marked  initial  successes. 
In  three  days — from  April  16th  to  April  19th — they 
took  seventeen  thousand  prisoners  and  seventy-five 
guns.  The  German  first  line  was  broken  through 
without  difficulty.  Hindenburg  retorted  with  violent 
counter-attacks.     By  May  the  French  offensive  had 


The  West  Front  in  1917— Cambrai  33 l 

been  worn  down.  Craonne,  at  the  eastern  end  of  the 
Chemin  des  Dames,  had  been  reached.  The  ap- 
proaches to  the  western  end,  east  of  Vauxaillon,  had 
also  been  seized. 

But  the  Aisne  operation  had  been  exceedingly  costly. 
The  troops  engaged  in  it  thought  that  there  had  been 
insufficient  artillery  preparation.  There  were  rumours 
of  a  serious  impairment  of  morale.  In  the  fall  of  191 6 
General  Nivelle  had  replaced  Joffre  as  Commander-in- 
Chief  of  the  French  armies.  The  battle  of  the  Aisne 
had  been  fought  under  his  direction.  It  had  hardly 
ended  before  he  was  removed.  Petain  replaced  him 
as  Commander-in-Chief  and  Foch  was  made  Chief-of- 
Staff. 

These  changes  had  an  immediate  effect  on  French 
military  policy.  France  had  borne  an  enormous  bur- 
den in  1916.  The  Somme  had  followed  Verdun  and 
the  losses  in  those  two  campaigns  probably  ran  well 
over  five  hundred  thousand.  The  French,  with  their 
highly  organized  military  machine  and  their  limited 
resources,  never  relished  a  mere  war  of  attrition.  And 
already  in  May,  19 17,  Petain  and  Foch  saw  that  much 
better  use  could  be  made  of  the  armies  France  had  in 
the  field  than  to  exhaust  them  in  premature  and  usuri- 
ous offensives.  The  man  power  of  the  United  States 
would  be  available  within  sixteen  or  eighteen  months. 


33-    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

And  with  that  reinforcement  the  Allies  would  be  in  a 
position  to  try  for  something  more  worth  while  than 
a  decision  through  mutual  exhaustion. 

The  French  armies  needed  a  rest  in  191 7.  In  that 
year  also  civilian  morale  was  undermined  by  weak- 
nesses in  governmental  policy  and  a  widespread  cam- 
paign of  defeatism.  The  Bolo  Pasha,  Humbert,  Bonnet 
Rouge,  Malvy,  and  Caillaux  disclosures  were  soon  to 
uncover  the  extent  of  the  insidious  anti-war  and  pro- 
German  propaganda.  Factionalism  had  again  become 
pronounced  in  the  Chamber  of  Deputies.  The  Briand 
government  fell  in  March,  19 17.  The  Ribot  govern- 
ment, which  succeeded,  was  upset  in  September.  Then 
came  the  Painleve  government,  which  lasted  until 
November.  Only  when  Clemenceau  came  into  power 
with  his  programme  of  "I  make  war"  and  his  pledges 
to  prosecute  defeatists,  no  matter  how  powerful  their 
political  connections,  was  France  again  able  to  emerge 
from  the  shadow  of  pacifistic  war  weariness. 

It  was  Petain's  task,  in  1917^0  build  up  the  French 
armies,  restore  their  spirit  and  confidence  and  fit  them 
for  the  great  role  they  were  to  play  in  191 8.  He  did 
this  by  a  wise  economy  in  offensive  operations  and  a 
skilful  and  sparing  defence,  when  attacked. 

Hindenburg  was  unwilling  to  give  up  the  Chemin 
des  Dames.     The  Crown  Prince  of  Prussia,  who  had 


The  West  Front  in  1917— Cambrai  333 

nominal  command  in  this  sector,  spent  most  of  the 
summer  trying  to  loosen  the  grip  of  the  French  on  the 
two  ends  of  this  famous  highroad.  He  lost  about  one 
hundred  thousand  men  in  these  fruitless  attempts. 
Petain  bided  his  time.  In  October,  after  the  German 
assaults  had  died  down,  he  executed  one  of  the  most 
brilliant  local  operations  of  the  war.  Striking  on  a  six- 
mile  front,  north-east  of  Soissons,  he  quickly  penetrated 
the  German  line  to  the  depth  of  a  mile  and  half.  The 
co-operation  between  the  artillery,  the  tanks,  the  air- 
planes, and  the  infantry  was  admirable.  Twelve 
thousand  prisoners  and  two  hundred  guns  were  captured. 

The  German  hold  on  the  Chemin  des  Dames  now 
became  precarious.  On  November  1st  the  Crown 
Prince  abandoned  the  entire  ridge  and  withdrew  to 
positions  behind  the  Ailette  River.  These  positions 
were  held  by  the  Germans  until  Ludendorff's  drive  for 
the  Marne  opened  in  May,  191 8.  But  in  the  interval 
the  mode  of  warfare  on  the  Western  Front  had  been 
revolutionized.  Petain  advanced  one  mile  and  a  half 
and  was  content  to  stop.  The  first  day  of  the  drive 
in  May,  191 8,  saw  the  Germans  at  the  Aisne;  the 
second  saw  them  at  the  Vesle.  In  five  days  they  had 
pushed  almost  to  Chateau-Thierry. 

In  October,  191 7,  such  an  advance  would  have 
seemed  to  be  absolutely  prohibited  by  the  narrow  limi- 


334    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

tations  of  rigid  positional  warfare.  But  even  before 
the  year  191 7  ended,  there  was  a  startling  demonstra- 
tion of  the  fact  that  the  era  of  those  limitations  was 
passing.  The  battle  of  Cambrai,  fought  in  November, 
marked  the  sudden  transition  from  positional  fighting 
to  open  or  semi-open  fighting.  It  was,  therefore,  one 
of  the  turning  points  of  the  war.  For  if  open  fighting 
was  to  succeed  trench  fighting,  so-called,  the  whole 
strategic  problem  on  the  West  Front  would  be  altered. 
The  deadlock  of  1915,  1916,  and  191 7,  would  be  broken. 
The  war  would  cease  to  wear  the  monotonous  aspect 
of  a  mere  process  of  usury.  Strategy  in  the  broad  sense 
would  again  come  into  play  and  a  decision,  obtained 
by  military  insight  and  the  superior  handling  of  armies, 
could  not  be  long  postponed. 

Cambrai  caught  everybody  more  or  less  off  guard. 
It  was  a  bold  experiment,  reflecting  great  credit  on  the 
British  High  Command.  But  its  success  so  far  sur- 
passed expectations  that  no  adequate  preparations 
had  been  made  to  follow  it  up.  After  dreaming  for 
three  years  of  a  real  ' '  break-through ' '  the  Allies  all  at 
once  found  themselves  with  a  "break-through"  on 
their  hands.  They  hardly  knew  what  to  do  with  it. 
Before  they  were  ready  to  exploit  it  the  door  of  oppor- 
tunity was  rudely  closed. 

The  city  of  Cambrai  was  one  of  the  chief  bastions 


The  West  Front  in  1917— Cambrai  335 

of  the  Hindenburg  zone.  It  was  a  vital  centre  of  com- 
munications and  base  of  supplies.  Unlike  St.  Quentin, 
which  was  out  on  the  fighting  line  and  was  partially 
encircled  by  the  Allies,  Cambrai  lay  nearly  ten  miles 
to  the  rear.  Its  security  was  taken  for  granted.  Ap- 
parently it  was  less  exposed  than  La  Fere,  or  Douai,  or 
Lille. 

Sir  Douglas  Haig,  therefore,  took  the  Germans  by 
surprise  when  he  elected  to  attack  on  this  front.  He 
took  them  even  more  by  surprise  through  the  novelty 
of  his  tactics.  Every  other  offensive  had  been  heralded 
by  artillery  preparation  of  some  sort,  although  the 
duration  of  "drum  fire"  had  been  materially  lessened 
in  191 7,  compared  with  1916,  or  even  with  191 5.  Now 
the  British  dispensed  with  "drum  fire"  altogether. 
For  the  destruction  of  the  obstacles  in  the  German 
fore  zone  they  depended  entirely  on  the  tanks. 

Cambrai  was  the  first  battle  in  which  the  tank  be- 
came the  major  offensive  factor.  Four  hundred  of 
these  line  breakers  were  collected  and  started  forward 
at  dawn  on  November  20th.  The  sky  was  overcast 
and  artificial  smoke  clouds  were  also  used  to  cover  the 
advance.  The  result  was  that  the  tanks  reached  the 
German  first  line  almost  unobserved,  crashed  through 
and  pushed  on  over  the  second  line  into  the  open. 
The    German    defence    was    stunned.     Ten    thousand 


336    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

prisoners  were  taken  in  a  few  hours  by  the  supporting 
troops.  The  way  lay  clear  for  miles  back  toward 
Cambrai,  and  the  line  of  the  Scheldt  River  south 
toward  Le  Catelet. 

The  front  broken  by  the  British  ran  north-west  and 
south-east — from  a  point  east  of  Le  Catelet  to  a  point 
a  little  west  of  Queant.  After  piercing  the  centre,  a 
part  of  the  British  Third  Army  faced  almost  north, 
striking  for  the  Cambrai-Bapaume  highroad,  with 
Bourlon  Wood  as  their  immediate  objective.  Another 
part  pushed  east  for  the  Scheldt,  reaching  the  Scheldt 
Canal  at  Marcoing,  and  again,  still  further  east,  at 
Masnieres  and  Crevecceur.  A  blunted  salient  was  thus 
driven  into  the  territory  behind  the  Hindenburg  Line, 
that  line  constituting  the  base,  and  the  two  sides  meet- 
ing at  an  apex  at  Crevecceur,  directly  south  of  Cam- 
brai. The  extreme  penetration  from  the  base  to  the 
apex  was  between  eight  and  nine  miles. 

Many  soldiers  who  took  part  in  the  battle  have 
recalled  the  exhilaration  they  felt  in  marching  through 
a  country  almost  untouched  by  the  war.  They  had 
lived  for  months  in  the  artificial  desert  which  Hinden- 
burg had  created  when  he  drew  out  of  the  Noyon  salient. 
They  had  seen  nothing  but  a  barren  waste,  treeless, 
without  vegetation,  disfigured  with  ruins  and  shell 
holes.     Now  they  were  passing  along  well-kept  roads 


The  West  Front  in  1917— Cambrai  337 

and  through  up-standing  villages  and  cultivated  fields. 
It  was  an  experience  which  could  not  fail  to  impress 
men  accustomed  to  the  forbidding  limitations  of  the 
old  positional  warfare. 

On  November  21st  the  Third  Army  made  some  fur- 
ther gains.  But  German  resistance  on  the  north  side 
of  the  triangle,  nearest  Cambrai,  began  to  stiffen. 
It  was  the  original  hope  of  the  British  High  Command 
to  make  at  least  a  cavalry  raid  on  Cambrai  and  destroy 
the  stores  collected  there.  But  that  idea  was  given  up 
and  General  Byng's  efforts  were  centred  on  holding 
Bourlon  Wood,  whose  heights  commanded  the  city  and 
a  long  stretch  of  the  Scheldt  Valley.  To  do  more  than 
that  large  reinforcements  were  required  and  these 
were  not  at  hand.  So  up  to  November  26th  the  British 
fought  desperately  to  clear  the  wood  and  hold  it  against 
continuous  German  counter-attacks.  These  proved 
too  powerful  and  in  the  last  days  of  November  the 
British  were  barely  holding  their  own  on  the  northern 
face  of  the  salient. 

On  November  30th  a  general  counter-offensive  was 
started  by  the  Germans.  It  failed  on  the  northern 
face  and  about  the  apex.  But  the  southern  face  of 
the  triangle  was  broken  in  and  the  whole  British  position 
was  imperilled.  Here  the  strange  experiences  of  the 
first    day's    open    fighting    were    repeated.     German 


338    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

columns  suddenly  appeared  far  in  the  rear  of  the  British 
lines.  One  British  general  was  reported  to  have  escaped 
f^om  his  headquarters  clad  in  pajamas.  A  British 
hospital  commander,  Sir  Conan  Doyle  reports,  was 
astonished  to  find  a  German  sentry  posted  at  the 
hospital  door  and  sent  him  out  a  cup  of  tea.  American 
engineers  at  work  far  inside  the  lines,  as  they  supposed, 
had  to  throw  away  their  tools  and  borrow  guns  to  defend 
themselves  against  enemy  detachments. 

The  Cambrai  salient  crumpled  up  in  a  few  hours. 
General  Byng  threw  in  his  scanty  reserves  to  save  the 
southern  front  and  rapidly  withdrew  his  forces  from 
the  eastern  and  northern  sectors.  About  half  the 
area  originally  conquered  had  to  be  surrendered.  The 
British  lost  one  hundred  guns  and  about  six  thousand 
prisoners. 

This  reverse,  as  dramatic  as  the  initial  victory  was, 
obscured  for  a  time  the  real  value  of  Byng's  achieve- 
ment. He  was  not  to  blame  for  the  ultimate  failure  of 
the  operation;  for  he  was  not  adequately  supported. 
But  the  tactical  results  of  the  battle  were  of  minor 
importance.  Its  significance  in  the  history  of  the  war 
lay  in  the  fact  that  it  had  reintroduced  open  warfare. 
It  was  the  last  stage  in  the  evolution  from  trench  dead- 
lock to  the  warfare  of  movement. 

First,  the  trench  had  paralyzed  the  power  of  the 


The  West  Front  in  1917— Cambrai  339 

offensive.  Then  the  intensified  artillery  attack  had 
destroyed  the  resisting  power  of  the  trench.  The 
Hindenburg  lightly  held  fore  zone  had  succeeded  the 
ponderous  first -line  defences.  Now  the  tank  had  come 
in  to  neutralize  the  "pill  box"  frontal  defence,  against 
which  "drum  fire"  was  useless.  The  cycle  was  com- 
plete. It  was  only  necessary  to  develop  the  Byng  tank 
attack  in  order  to  make  every  defence  line  vulnerable. 
But  one  dependable  weapon  was  left  in  the  hands  of 
the  defensive — the  infantry  counter-attack.  And  when 
the  infantry  counter-attack  constituted  the  chief  and 
final  resource  of  the  defensive,  infantry  had  recovered 
its  proud  and  ancient  status.  Open  or  semi-open 
methods  of  warfare  were  inescapable. 

Byng's  attack  at  Cambrai  was  the  forerunner  of  the 
Hutier  attack  at  St.  Quentin,  in  March,  1918,  from 
which  the  British  Fifth  Army  was  to  suffer  so  deplor- 
ably. It  was  equally  the  forerunner  of  Foch's  relent- 
less "all-front"  offensives. 

The  German  counter-attack  had  stopped  the  British 
drive  for  Cambrai,  just  as  it  had  stopped  the  drive  for 
Roulers  and  Lille,  in  the  north,  and  the  drive  in  April, 
east  of  Arras,  for  Douai — if  Douai  was  at  that  time 
Haig's  ultimate  objective.  But  the  counter-attack  is 
a  costly  expedient.  Its  continual  use  is  an  admission 
on  the  part  of  the  commander  employing  it  that  his 


340    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

system  of  defence  has  become  ineffective.  He  sup- 
plements the  defensive  by  a  limited  local  offensive. 
Thus  he  incurs  all  the  tactical  risks  and  handicaps 
of  the  offensive,  without  enjoying  its  compensating 
strategical  advantages — the  chief  among  the  latter 
being  ample  time  to  organize  attacks  and  freedom  in 
the  choice  of  the  field  of  action. 

This  policy  of  counter-attack  as  a  prop  to  the  de- 
fensive was  distasteful  to  the  German  General  Staff. 
Circumstances  over  which  the  German  commanders 
had  no  control  compelled  its  adoption  on  an  increasing 
scale  in  191 7.  Freytag-Loringhoven  makes  this  point 
clear  in  his  Deductions  from  the  World  War.  Although 
the  Germans  considered  themselves  superior  to  the 
Allies  in  open  warfare,  they  shrank  instinctively  from 
encouraging  anything  like  a  return  to  open  warfare 
while  they  stood  on  the  defensive  on  the  Western  Front. 
Freytag-Loringhoven    says : 

According  to  the  notions  that  prevailed  up  to  that 
time  (to  the  time  of  the  adoption  of  a  strict  defensive) 
the  possibility  might  have  been  considered,  where 
our  troops  were  suffering  heavy  loses  as  a  result  of 
holding  on  under  exposure  to  the  fire  of  the  enemy's 
heavy  artillery  and  bomb-throwers,  and  where  the 
latter  had  done  destruction  to  our  trenches,  of  al- 
lowing the  enemy  to  break  through  and  then  driving 
him  back  again  by  means  of  the  reserves  at  the  back 
of  the  line.     This  procedure  was,  in  fact,  from  the 


The  West  Front  in  1917— Cambrai  341 

beginning  employed  several  times  with  success  at 
various  sections  of  the  front  against  bodies  of  the 
enemy's  forces  which  had  broken  through.  To 
extend  it  systematically  to  larger  sections  of  the 
front,  and  thereby  on  our  side  to  resort  to  a  certain 
extent  to  the  methods  of  the  war  of  movement, 
seemed  to  the  supreme  command  for  a  long  time 
inadvisable,  in  view  of  the  limited  forces  and  artillery 
at  their  disposition. 

It  did  not  seem  advisable  to  leave  large  sections 
of  the  front  open  to  the  enemy  with  a  view  to  sub- 
sequently meeting  him  in  a  great  offensive  engage- 
ment on  French  or  Belgian  territory  occupied  by 
us,  thereby  giving  the  situation  quite  a  different 
character  from  a  strategic  point-of-view.  Such  a 
counter-attack  on  a  large  scale  would  have  involved 
the  reconquest  of  the  newly  organized  enemy  posi- 
tions, and  if  the  counter-attack  did  not  effect  a  com- 
plete recovery,  this  method  would  in  course  of  time 
have  amounted  to  the  surrender  of  larger  and  larger 
portions  of  the  enemy  territory  occupied  by  our 
troops.   .   .   . 

Moreover,  quite  apart  from  the  moral  factor, 
which  in  these  days  of  extreme  publicity  has  quite 
another  significance  than  was  formerly  the  case, 
and  apart  from  the  endeavours  of  the  enemy  press 
to  exploit  for  their  own  ends  even  our  most  trifling 
reverses  (such  reverses  as  were  inevitable  from  time 
to  time)  the  objects  at  stake  were  far  too  precious  to 
justify  us  in  yielding  up  large  stretches  of  territory, 
even  if  it  were  only  temporarily.  We  had  to  strive 
to  turn  to  the  best  possible  account  the  produc- 
tive district  of  Northern  France,  with  its  wealth  of 
industries. 


342    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

But  after  Cambrai  it  was  plain  that  the  defensive 
must  always  contemplate  the  possibility  of  having 
large  sections  of  the  front  broken,  and  of  having  to 
repair  those  breaches  by  considerable  counter  offensives. 
This  change  in  the  conditions  of  warfare  operated 
against  the  Germans,  just  as  the  change  to  rigid  posi- 
tional warfare,  at  the  end  of  1914,  operated  against 
the  Allies.  Germany's  natural  policy  was  to  maintain 
an  alert  defensive  in  the  West.  After  the  strength  of 
the  United  States  was  thrown  into  the  balance  against 
her,  it  was  more  than  ever  to  her  interest  that  the 
value  of  the  defensive  should  not  be  impaired.  For  if 
open  or  semi-open  warfare  became  practicable  again, 
Germany's  hope  of  holding  out  against  superior  Allied 
numbers  would  quickly  vanish. 

Cambrai  was  therefore  one  more  argument  for  that 
shift  to  the  offensive  which  Ludendorff  was  about  to 
make  and  for  which  he  began  preparing  only  a  few 
weeks  after  his  violent  counter-attack  had  broken 
Byng's  salient.  But  on  an  offensive  basis  Germany 
could  not  last  long.  A  quick  decision  was  needed.  So 
Ludendorff  felt  constrained  to  stake  all  he  had  on  a 
single  throw.  If  he  could  not  win  in  the  first  six 
months  of  191 8,  he  virtually  obligated  himself  to  con- 
cede victory  to  the  Allies. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 
Italy's  part  in  the  war 

The  Wars  of  Liberation  in  the  middle  of  the  last 
century  ended  Austria's  rule  in  Northern  Italy.  Ma- 
genta and  Solferino  freed  Lombardy.  Sadowa  freed 
Venetia.  From  the  political  point-of-view,  Italy  at- 
tained unity  and  independence.  But  from  the  mili- 
tary point-of-view  she  failed  to  achieve  security.  The 
new  kingdom  was  left  with  an  Adriatic  coast  line  desti- 
tute of  harbours  and  naval  bases.  And  the  northern 
boundary,  as  traced  on  the  map,  was  valueless  because 
it  lacked  all  the  elements  of  a  true  military  frontier. 
Austria  still  commanded  the  Italian  Plain,  because  she 
retained  the  passes  through  the  northern  mountain 
barrier. 

A  glance  at  the  map  discloses  Italy's  predicament. 
There  is  hardly  a  shelter  along  the  western  Adriatic 
shore  from  the  Straits  of  Otranto  to  the  Gulf  of  Venice. 
But  the  eastern  shore  is  rich  in  natural  harbours — among 
them  Cattaro,  Fiume,  Pola,  and  Trieste.  The  north- 
eastern frontier,  as  it  was  in  19 14,  was  fairly  defensible. 

343 


344    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

But  further  west  the  Austrian  Trentino  projected  like 
a  huge  sally-port  into  the  heart  of  Northern  Italy. 
Out  of  the  Trentino  six  passes  led  to  the  Italian  Plain, 
the  westernmost  being  that  of  the  Adige  Valley,  the 
historical  corridor  for  Teutonic  invasions.  The  natural 
military  frontier  of  Italy  in  this  region  ran  about  one 
hundred  miles  to  the  north  of  the  geographical  one, 
covering  the  Brenner  Pass  and  the  Reschen  Pass.  So 
long  as  the  Brenner  Pass,  the  Upper  Adige  Valley,  Trent, 
and  the  Val  Sugana  remained  in  Austrian  hands,  Italy 
was  left  with  a  neighbour  intrenched  within  her  gates. 
In  case  of  war  with  Austria  she  would  be  tied  down  to 
a  choice  between  a  difficult  defensive  on  the  Trentino 
front  and  a  precarious  offensive   along   the  Isonzo. 

Italy's  lack  of  a  defensive  frontier  vitally  affected 
her  national  policy.  Austria  was  the  hereditary  enemy. 
But  when  anger  at  the  French  occupation  of  Tunis 
drove  Italy  into  an  alliance  with  Germany  and  Austria- 
Hungary,  the  union,  though  unnatural,  served  a  defen- 
sive purpose.  If  Austro-Italian  relations  were  not  to 
remain  openly  hostile,  the  next  best  thing  was  to  create 
a  concord  based  on  artificial  interest.  For  Italy  the  en- 
tente with  Austria-Hungary  was  never  a  matter  of  the 
heart.  But  it  tided  over  a  period  of  Italian  depres- 
sion and  isolation.  The  Triple  Alliance  was  effected 
in   1882  and  lasted  thirty-three  years.     During   that 


Italy's  Part  in  the  War  345 

period  the  new  Italian  state  had  time  to  mature  and 
consolidate. 

But  an  artificial  union  of  this  sort  couldn't  endure. 
Italy  and  Austria-Hungary  travelled  divergent  paths 
and  had  conflicting  ambitions.  Each  viewed  with 
distrust  the  other's  aspirations  in  the  Balkans.  Italy 
still  sought  a  foothold  in  Northern  Africa  and  looked 
askance  at  the  growing  friendship  between  Germany 
and  Turkey.  When  the  Entente  Powers  guaranteed 
her  a  free  hand  in  Tripoli  she  showed  no  compunctions 
about  running  counter  to  Teuton  policies.  Her  war 
with  Turkey  had  strained  relations  with  Berlin  and 
Vienna.  After  the  Balkan  wars  she  came  into  colli- 
sion with  Austria-Hungary  over  Albania. 

The  provisions  of  the  Triple  Alliance  convention 
did  not  tie  Italy  fast  to  her  two  Teuton  associates. 
Strangely  enough  they  actually  brought  her  into  conflict 
with  them.  The  compact  was  defensive  in  character. 
It  bound  each  signatory  to  go  to  the  aid  of  either  of 
the  others,  if  "without  direct  provocation  on  its  part" 
it ' '  should  be  attacked  by  another  power. ' '  But  neither 
Austria-Hungary  nor  Germany  was  attacked  by  an- 
other power.  Vienna  declared  war  on  Serbia.  Ger- 
many declared  war  on  Russia  and  France.  So  Italy 
was  released  mechanically  from  any  obligation,  except 
to  preserve  "a  benevolent  neutrality." 


346    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

But  there  were  other  entangling  provisions.  The 
Triple  Alliance  compact  dealt  with  the  possibility  of  a 
change  of  the  status  quo  in  the  Balkans,  or  in  the 
Turkish  possessions  in  Europe,  occasioned  by  a  war  in 
which  either  Italy  or  Austria-Hungary  should  become 
engaged.  It  stipulated  that  temporary  or  permanent 
occupation  of  Balkan  or  Turkish  territory  should  occur 
only  after  previous  agreement  between  the  two  Powers 
and  should  be  accompanied  by  compensation  to  the 
non-belligerent  ally.  Since  Austria-Hungary  had  twice 
invaded  Serbia  and  had  made  no  propositions  to 
Italy  regarding  compensation  in  case  of  a  temporary 
or  permanent  occupation  of  that  country,  the  Italian 
Government  began,  in  December,  19 14,  to  press  for 
concessions,   in  harmony  with   the  treaty  provisions. 

Italy  first  occupied  Avlona  on  her  own  motion. 
Then  she  demanded  cessions  which  would  restore  to 
her  portions  of  the  Italian  Irredenta  in  Trentino  and 
Istria  and  would  help  to  rectify  her  northern  frontier. 

Austria-Hungary  met  these  demands  in  part.  There 
was  never  any  probability  that  she  would  meet  them 
in  full.  So  Italy  gradually  drifted  into  a  position  in 
which  her  national  policy  compelled  her  to  break  rela- 
tions with  Austria-Hungary  and  to  seek  to  satisfy  her 
territorial  aspirations  through  war. 

The  Entente  powers  needed  Italy's  help  and  were  will- 


Italy's  Part  in  the  War  347 

ing  to  pay  a  price  for  it.  The  new  treaties  of  alliance 
which  she  signed  on  entering  the  war,  fully  recognized 
her  claims  to  a  defensive  northern  frontier  and  also 
gave  her  a  free  hand  on  the  eastern  shore  of  the  Adri- 
atic. But  the  circumstances  of  her  quarrel  with  Austria- 
Hungary  and  the  terms  of  her  adhesion  to  the  Entente 
both  inevitably  circumscribed  her  participation  in  the 
war.  Her  role  was  that  of  a  limited  partner.  Her 
thoughts  were  centred  on  the  liberation  of  the  Italian 
areas  still  under  the  Austrian  yoke.  She  wanted  to 
take  title  to  them  through  the  sword,  rather  than  await 
the  possibly  dubious  verdict  of  a  peace  conference. 

So  the  Italian  armies  were  committed  to  an  offensive 
on  perhaps  the  most  unpromising  front  in  Europe. 
Results  achieved  there  could  not  correspond  to  the 
effort  expended,  for  nature  was  an  enemy  more  difficult 
to  overcome  than  the  Hapsburg  legions. 

Moreover  the  Italian  operations,  owing  to  the  limita- 
tions of  the  terrain,  could  not  be  co-ordinated  help- 
fully with  other  Entente  operations.  The  Italian  enter- 
prise was  bound  to  be  an  independent  and  isolated 
one.  It  could  not  be  linked  up  with  any  schemes  of 
Allied  grand  strategy,  in  so  far  as  any  such  schemes 
could  be  considered  existent.  Italy  could  contribute 
to  the  Entente  a  reinforcement  of  from  three  million 
to  four   million   men.     But   this  reinforcement   could 


348   The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

never  be  put  to  a  really  telling  use,  because  of  the  lack 
of  Allied  unity  of  command.  Italy's  political  aims 
and  her  military  policy  (both  entirely  justifiable  from 
her  own  point-of-view)  operated  to  aggravate  the 
unfortunate  dispersion  of  Allied  resources. 

The  Italian  campaign  opened,  however,  with  high 
hopes.  General  Cadorna  concentrated  his  forces  in  Vene- 
tia  and  began  an  offensive  with  Trieste  as  its  objective. 
In  a  week  the  Italian  armies  were  on  the  line  of  the 
Isonzo  River,  the  first  barrier  of  the  Austrian  strategic 
frontier.  They  crossed  the  river  above  Tolmino  and 
stormed  Monte  Nero.  Tolmino  was  also  taken,  and 
below  Gorizia,  Monfalcone  and  Gradisca  were  captured 
early  in  June.  But  the  bridgehead  opposite  Gorizia 
held  out.     It  was  not  forced   until  August,  1916. 

On  the  other  fronts,  which  were  even  more  difficult, 
operations  in  191 5  were  confined  chiefly  to  strengthen- 
ing the  defensive  positions  of  the  Italian  armies.  In 
the  Adige  Valley  the  Italians  pushed  north  toward  the 
city  of  Trent,  reaching  Rovereto.  Toward  the  eastern 
end  of  the  Val  Sugana  they  reached  Borgo.  Only  so 
long  as  they  could  hold  fast  there,  and  on  the  Upper 
Brenta  and  Piave  fronts,  was  Cadorna  safe  in  develop- 
ing his  offensive  toward  Laibach  and  Trieste. 

The  Isonzo  operation  came  nearly  to  a  standstill 
after  July,  191 5.     Many  months  of  patient  preparation 


italy's  Part  in  the  War  349 

in  the  way  of  road  building,  blasting,  levelling,  and 
tunnelling  were  required  in  order  to  make  the  Gorizia 
bridgehead  ripe  for  storming.  Even  before  these  pre- 
parations were  completed,  the  Austrian  High  Com- 
mand demonstrated  the  inherent  weakness  of  the  whole 
Italian  position  by  striking  a  sudden  blow  in  the  West. 
In  April,  1915,  while  the  Germans  were  still  battering 
away  at  Verdun,  Field  Marshal  Conrad  Hoetzendorff 
concentrated  an  army  of  300,000  to  350,000  men  in 
Southern  Tyrol.  He  borrowed  some  German  17-inch 
howitzers  of  the  heaviest  type  to  supplement  his  own 
12-inch  Skodas  and  massed  about  750  heavy  and  1600 
lighter  guns  on  a  thirty  mile  front  from  Rovereto  to 
Borgo.  The  Italians  were  completely  outclassed  in 
artillery.  Their  positions  were  poorly  consolidated 
and  they  had  always  to  struggle  against  the  momentum 
of  a  down-hill  attack. 

Hoetzendorfl's  assault  began  on  May  14th.  It  was 
heaviest  in  the  centre,  converging  in  the  direction  of 
the  towns  of  Arsiero  and  Asiago,  both  about  eight 
miles  inside  the  Italian  border.  The  Italian  front 
covering  Arsiero  was  badly  broken.  By  the  end  of 
May  the  Austro-Hungarians  had  reached  their  two 
immediate  objectives  and  stood  only  ten  miles  from  the 
edge  of  the  Venetian  Plain.  Vicenza,  the  key  to  the 
plain,  was  only  twenty  miles  away. 


350    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

The  vice  of  the  Italian  situation  was  this.  The  ar- 
mies on  the  Isonzo — constituting  the  bulk  of  the  forces 
in  the  field — were  fighting  at  the  eastern  end  of  a  long 
corridor.  Their  main  line  of  communication  ran  back 
across  the  Northern  Plain  from  Udine  to  Treviso, 
to  Vicenza,  to  Verona,  to  Brescia,  and  thence  to  Milan. 
But  this  line  was  exposed,  all  the  way  to  Verona,  to 
attacks  coming  out  of  the  mountains,  from  ten  to 
fifteen  miles  away. 

Had  HoetzendorfT  been  able  to  carry  his  offensive 
to  Vicenza,  he  would  have  cut  the  connections  of  the 
Isonzo  armies  with  their  main  base — Milan.  They 
would  have  been  compelled  to  retreat  in  haste  out  of 
Venetia,  not  stopping  at  the  Piave,  as  they  did  after 
Caporetto,  but  keeping  on  to  the  Adige,  thus  abandon- 
ing the  city  of  Venice,  and  practically  all  Venetia, 
to  the  enemy.  Such  a  reverse  would  have  come  near 
putting  Italy  out  of  the  war. 

But  the  Austrian  armies  didn't  reach  the  plain. 
Russia  came  to  Italy's  rescue.  The  Brusiloff  offensive 
of  1916  was  launched  ahead  of  schedule  and  Austrian 
disasters  in  Volhynia  and  the  Bukowina  forced  Hoetzen- 
dorff  to  transfer  his  reserve  divisions  to  the  Eastern 
Front.  This  was  the  single  instance  of  really  effective 
military  concert  between  the  Western  Powers  and  Rus- 
sia.    Italy  benefited  by  it.     But,  on  the  other  hand, 


Italy's  Part  in  the  War  351 

it  deranged  the  strategy  of  the  Allied  eastern  campaign 
of  1916,  depriving  Rumania,  three  months  later,  of  the 
support  she  expected  from  Russia  and  leaving  her  an 
easy  prey  to  Falkenhayn  and  Mackensen. 

The  Austrian  attack  had  been  partially  stopped  in 
the  sector  south  of  Rovereto,  before  Brusiloff 's  offen- 
sive began.  It  died  away  after  Hoetzendorff's  attack 
on  the  Sette  Comuni  Plateau,  south  of  Asiago,  failed. 
The  Austrian  armies,  depleted  by  transfers  to  Galicia, 
now  assumed  the  defensive.  They  retired  to  Rovereto, 
under  Italian  pressure;  evacuated  Arsiero  and  Asiago 
and  occupied  strong  positions  just  inside  the  Italian 
frontier.  There,  they  remained  until  the  Teuton 
offensive  of  November,  191 7,  although  some  half- 
hearted attempts  to  retake  the  Asiago  Plateau  were 
made  by  them  in  May  of  that  year. 

For  the  Italians,  the  Trentino  front  remained  impas- 
sable until  the  last  week  of  the  war.  Cadorna  had  no 
option  but  to  turn  again — in  July,  191(3 — to  the  Isonzo 
iront.  On  August  4th  he  stormed  the  heights  on  the 
west  bank  of  the  river,  covering  Gorizia.  The  Austro- 
Hungarians  evacuated  the  city,  King  Victor  Emmanuel 
entering  it  on  August  9th. 

But  the  capture  of  Gorizia  left  the  Italian  task 
practically  as  difficult  as  ever.  To  the  north-east, 
guarding  the  road  to  Laibach,  lay  the  Bainsizza  Plateau, 


352    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

a  natural  fortress,  and  to  the  south-east,  protecting 
Trieste,  lay  the  Carso,  even  more  impregnable.  Of  the 
Carso,  against  which  Italian  attacks  were  to  beat  in- 
effectually for  more  than  two  years,  Professor  Douglas 
W.  Johnson,  of  Columbia  University,  says  in  his 
Topography  and  Strategy  in  the  War: 

It  is  not  easy,  adequately  to  conceive  the  stupen- 
dous difficulties  of  the  Carso  terrain.  The  plateau 
is  a  flat-topped  mountain  from  four  to  six  miles 
broad.  Its  sides  are  precipitous  and  as  it  rises  from 
three  or  four  hundred  to  more  than  a  thousand  feet 
above  the  surrounding  lowlands,  it  constitutes  a 
gigantic  rock-walled  castle,  whose  guns  control  with 
ease  the  city  of  Gorizia,  the  crossings  of  the  Isonzo, 
and  the  two  pathways  to  Trieste.  .  .  .  Like  other 
Karstlands,  the  surface  is  excessively  irregular,  pit- 
ted with  sink-holes  without  number  and  undermined 
by  subterranean  caverns.  The  sink-holes  end  in 
passageways  connecting  with  the  vast  labyrinth 
of  underground  caves  and  galleries.  Nature  thus 
provided  ready  to  hand  innumerable  concealed  sites 
for  heavy  artillery,  machine  gun  emplacements,  ob- 
servation stations,  and  secure  underground  retreats 
for  vast  numbers  of  troops.  And  what  nature  offered 
the  Austrians  had  accepted  and  improved'  by  long 
years  of  elaborate  fortification.  Trenches  had  been 
cut  in  the  solid  rock,  elaborate  systems  of  galleries 
and  tunnels  had  been  excavated,  gun  emplace- 
ments had  been  prepared  in  pits  quarried  for  the 
purpose,  and  the  whole  system  connected  by  covered 
communication    trenches    and    supplied    by    water 


Italy's  Part  in  the  War  353 

pumped  up  to  the  thirsty  surface  and  distributed  by 
pipe  lines. 

Cadorna  succeeded  in  getting  a  foothold  on  this 
forbidding  fortress,  storming  the  western  rim  in  August, 
and  enlarging  his  gains  in  September.  About  forty 
thousand  Austro-Hungarian  prisoners  were  taken  be- 
tween August  6th  and  November  4,  191 6.  But  the 
cost  of  this  effort  was  disproportionate  to  the  strategi- 
cal result.  Trieste  remained  secure  and  the  Austrian 
High  Command  was  able  to  maintain  the  Isonzo  lines 
with  forces  greatly  inferior  to  those  employed  by  Italy. 
The  Italian  military  effort  was  unprofitably  localized. 

Italian  strategy  was  not  modified  in  191 7.  It 
couldn't  well  be  modified,  so  long  as  Trieste  and  the 
Istrian  Irredenta  remained  its  objectives.  Cadorna's 
spring  offensive  was  delayed  by  unfavourable  weather. 
It  began  on  May  12th  with  an  artillery  attack  on  the 
whole  Isonzo  front.  The  infantry  now  got  a  lodgment 
on  the  south-western  edge  of  the  Bainsizza  Plateau, 
capturing  Monte  Cucco  and  the  lower  slopes  of  Monte 
Santo.  In  this  direction,  Cadorna  was  trying  to  pene- 
trate the  Chiapovano  Valley,  which  separates  the 
main  portion  of  the  Bainsizza  Plateau  from  the  southern 
section,  known  as  the  Ternovane. 

South  of  Gorizia  an  assault  was  made  on  May  23d 
and  the  days  following  on  the  Carso,  particularly  on 


354    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

the  lower  edge  fronting  the  sea.  Here  the  Italians 
captured  seventeen  thousand  prisoners  and  pushed  their 
lines  to  within  eleven  miles  of  Trieste.  Then  the  Austro- 
Hungarians  counter-attacked  and  recovered  part  of 
the  ground  lost. 

Another  major  effort  was  made  in  August.  The 
Second  Army,  under  General  Capello,  crossed  the  Upper 
Isonzo  and  effected  a  lodgment  on  the  northern  edge 
of  Bainsizza.  Its  right  wing  at  the  same  time  enveloped 
the  Austrian  positions  on  the  south-western  edge  and 
the  enemy  withdrew  to  the  eastern  side  of  the  plateau. 
Nearer  Gorizia  the  Italians  took  Monte  San  Gabriele 
and  Monte  San  Daniele,  commanding  the  Ternovane 
Plateau.  The  Third  Army,  under  the  Duke  of  Aosta, 
renewed  the  attack  on  Monte  Hermada,  which  barred 
the  coast  route  to  Trieste.  No  material  progress  was 
made  in  that  direction.  The  only  serious  dent  in  the 
Austro-Hungarian  defence  was  that  in  the  Bainsizza 
Plateau  sector.  But  the  deeper  the  Italians  got  into 
the  mountains  east  of  Gorizia,  the  more  exposed  they 
were  to  a  flanking  operation  coming  through  the  passes 
to  the  north-west. 

Cadorna  was  over-sanguine.  He  had  in  mind  always 
Laibach  and  a  victorious  march  like  Napoleon  the 
First's,  through  the  Julian  Alps  toward  Vienna.  There 
were  many  Italian  strategists  who  insisted  that  that 


Italy's  Part  in  the  War  355 

was  the  true  Allied  highway  into  the  heart  of  the 
enemy's  country.  Cadorna  had  not  carefully  studied 
German  General  Staff  psychology.  Nor  had  he  anti- 
cipated the  military  consequences  of  Russia's  with- 
drawal from  the  war.  Italy's  position  in  the  fall  of 
191 7,  in  fact,  presented  an  ominous  parallel  to  Serbia's 
position  in  the  fall  of  191 5  and  Rumania's  position  in 
the  fall  of  1 91 6. 

Italy's  best  armies  had  been  tied  up  for  two  years 
in  the  Isonzo  venture.  They  had  just  finished  their 
second  191 7  offensive.  The  line  guarding  their  flank 
was  entrusted  to  less  dependable  troops.  Against 
those  troops,  Ludendorff  was  about  to  launch  a  veteran 
German  army,  brought  from  the  Dvina  front,  sup- 
plemented by  first  line  Austro-Hungarian  divisions  re- 
called from  Galicia  and  the  Carpathians.  To  General 
Otto  Below  was  given  the  role  which  had  been  en- 
trusted to  Mackensen  in  Serbia  and  Rumania. 

The  German  plan  was  simplicity  itself.  Below's 
Fourteenth  German  Army  was  collected  about  the 
headwaters  of  the  Tagliamento  and  the  Isonzo,  screened 
from  enemy  observation.  It  was  to  overwhelm  the 
weak  Italian  line,  holding  the  southernmost  ridges  of 
the  Julian  Alps  and  then  burst. down  into  the  Italian 
Plain  toward  Cividale  and  Udine — far  in  the  rear  of 
the  Italian  armies  to  the  east  of  the  lower  Isonzo. 


356    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

The  offensive  was  set  for  October  24th.  It  came  as 
a  nearly  complete  surprise.  Even  if  it  hadn't  been  a 
surprise,  the  Italian  line  could  hardly  have  held.  As 
it  was,  the  German  gas  attacks  and  heavy  artillery 
fire  demoralized  the  Italian  defenders,  and  the  infantry 
had  little  difficulty  in  breaking  through  both  at  and 
above  Tolmino  and  still  further  north-west,  at  Capo- 
retto,  whence  the  Natisone  River  Valley  runs  south 
to  Cividale  and  Udine.  Cividale  was  taken  on  October 
28th;  Udine,  the  headquarters  of  the  Italian  General 
Staff  and  the  chief  base  of  the  Isonzo  armies,  fell  on 
October  30th. 

The  Second  and  Third  Italian  armies  were  now  threat- 
ened with  envelopment.  They  fled  west  toward  the 
lower  Tagliamento.  The  break-through  at  Caporetto 
also  compromised  the  Fourth  Army,  holding  the  line 
of  the  Carnic  Alps  in  the  upper  reaches  of  the  Piave 
River.  It  was  compelled  to  retreat  in  even  greater 
disorder  than  the  Isonzo  forces,  for  the  roads  out  of 
the  mountains  were  few  and  bad. 

The  first  rallying  line  was  the  Tagliamento.  The 
Italians  lost  180,000  prisoners  and  1500  guns  before 
they  halted  there.  But  the  Tagliamento  line  could 
easily  be  turned  from  the  north.  So  the  retreat  con- 
tinued to  the  Livenza  and  then  to  the  Piave.  This 
last  named  river  furnished  a  barrier  across  the  Vene- 


Italy's  Part  in  the  War  357 

tian  Plain,  from  the  sea  to  the  foothills  of  the  Alps, 
whence  the  line  of  defence  was  prolonged  west  to  form 
a  junction  with  the  armies  in  the  Brenta  and  Adige 
sectors.  In  those  sectors  the  Italians  had  retired 
toward  the  precarious  positions  which  they  had  held 
at  the  close  of  the  Austrian  offensive  of  191 6. 

By  the  middle  of  November  Italy's  military  power 
seemed  on  the  point  of  breaking.  The  great  retreat 
had  cost  in  all  250,000  prisoners  and  2300  guns.  The 
losses  in  killed  and  wounded  were  probably  150,000 
more.  French  and  British  divisions  had  to  be  sent 
from  France  to  stiffen  the  new  Piave  line.  Italy  was 
humiliated  and  chagrined.  The  Allied  publics  were 
despondent. 

General  Cadorna  officially  attributed  the  disaster  at 
Caporetto  to  the  bad  conduct  of  the  left  wing  of  the 
Second  Army.  He  said  in  a  bulletin  issued  on  October 
28th: 

Lack  of  resistance  on  the  part  of  a  portion  of  the 
Second  Army,  which  surrendered  either  disloyally 
or  shamefully,  allowed  the  Austro-German  forces 
to  break  through  the  left  wing  of  the  Italian  front. 
The  praiseworthy  efforts  of  other  troops  could  not 
prevent  the  enemy  from  violating  our  sacred  soil. 

There  were  many  wild  rumours  of  disaffection  and 
defeatist  propaganda,  of  cowardice,  and  incompetency 


358    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

on  the  part  of  both  men  and  officers.  But  there  is 
little  reason  to  think  that  Below's  victory  was  due  to 
Italian  collusion.  It  was  a  clear-cut  military  operation, 
bold  in  design  and  executed  with  admirable  precision. 
Probably  no  other  body  of  Italian  troops  equal  in 
numbers  would  have  succeeded  in  holding  the  exposed 
line  which  a  part  of  the  Second  Army  failed  to  hold. 
In  March,  1919,  General  Rosso,  one  of  the  commanders 
on  the  Caporetto  front,  was  tried  by  court-martial 
and  acquitted  of  charges  of  negligence  and  misconduct 
in  the  face  of  the  enemy. 

The  Caporetto  disaster  was,  speaking  broadly,  the 
natural  consequence  of  Italy's  hopelessly  exposed  posi- 
tion. Below  merely  did  what  Hoetzendorff  came  so 
near  doing  the  year  before.  Italian  defeat  was  also 
a  consequence  of  Allied  disunity  of  command.  Had 
there  been  but  one  Allied  front  in  Europe — or  even  in 
Western  Europe — and  unified  control  on  that  front, 
Italy  would  never  have  prolonged  her  unavailing  offen- 
sive against  Trieste  and  Laibach.  She  would  have 
retained  ample  forces  to  defend  herself  on  her  northern 
border  and  at  the  same  time  would  have  contributed 
her  surplus  divisions  to  some  joint  Allied  effort  in  a 
more  promising  field — for  instance,  to  the  Salonica 
offensive  of  191 6,  which  was  intended  to  reach  Sofia 
and  the  Danube,  but  only  got  as  far  as  Monastir. 


Italy's  Part  in  the  War  359 

Caporetto  was  one  more  demonstration  of  the  folly 
of  Allied  go-as-you-please  generalship.  It  led  to  the 
Rapallo  conference  of  Allied  Premiers,  which  voted  for 
unity  of  control  but  did  nothing  more  effective  than 
appoint  an  inter-Allied  General  Staff.  In  a  speech  in 
Paris,  on  November  12,  191 7,  discussing  the  Rapallo 
meeting,  Premier  Lloyd  George  said : 

The  Italian  disaster  necessitated  action  without 
delay  to  repair  it.  It  is  true  that  we  sent  troops  to 
Salonica  to  succour  Serbia,  but,  as  always,  they  were 
sent  too  late.  Half  the  men  who  fell  in  the  vain 
effort  to  pierce  the  Western  Front  in  September 
that  same  year,  would  have  saved  Serbia,  saved  the 
Balkans,  and  completed  the  blockade  of  Germany. 
1915  was  the  year  of  the  Serbian  tragedy;  1916  was 
the  year  of  the  Rumanian  tragedy,  which  was  a  re- 
petition of  the  Serbian  story,  almost  without  change. 
National  and  professional  traditions,  questions  of 
prestige  and  susceptibilities,  all  conspired  to  ren- 
der our  best  decisions  vain.  The  war  has  been 
prolonged  by  particularism.  It  will  be  shortened  by 
solidarity. 

Yet  particularism  was  not  overcome  even  by  the 
Caporetto  tragedy.  Powerful  influences  in  Great 
Britain  still  stood  out  for  divided  military  control. 
Even  British  civilians  were  distrustful  of  it.  William  II 
had  said  in  a  speech  on  December  22 ,  191 7:  "With 
a  centralized  direction  the  German  army  works  in  a 


3<5o    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

centralized  manner."  He  was  probably  thinking  of  all 
the  armies  of  the  Teutonic  alliance,  as  constituting  a 
single  German  army.  And  his  remark  emphasized 
the  enormous  superiority  in  that  respect  of  German 
military  policy  over  Allied  military  policy.  It  is  signi- 
ficant of  the  obtuseness  of  English  opinion  on  this 
point,  even  as  late  as  the  winter  of  191 8,  that  The  Na- 
tional Review,  for  January  of  that  year,  should  have 
resented  the  Kaiser's  matter-of-fact  statement  as  "a 
hint  to  the  Allies  to  make  the  mistake  of  putting  a 
Generalissimo  over  their  armies,  which  would  provoke 
friction,  as  our  circumstances  are  so  different  from 
those  of  the  enemy,  in  whose  councils  only  one 
Power  counts."  It  took  still  another  great  disas- 
ter— the  British  defeat  before  St.  Quentin — to  wring 
British  consent  to  unified  command  under  General 
Foch. 

General  Cadorna  was  relieved  from  the  command  of 
the  Italian  armies  about  the  middle  of  November, 
General  Diaz  taking  his  place.  The  new  chief's  prob- 
lem was  to  hold  fast  on  the  new  Piave  line.  He  was 
able  to  check  the  enemy  on  the  lower  Piave.  But  in 
the  mountain  reaches  between  the  Piave  and  the 
Brenta  the  Italians  were  many  times  in  desperate 
straits.  Open  weather  favoured  the  invaders.  Their 
attacks  continued  through  November  and  up  to  De- 


Italy's  Part  in  the  War  361 

cember  30th.  By  that  time  they  had  taken  thirty 
thousand  more  prisoners  and  had  pushed  south  to 
within  four  miles  of  the  Venetian  Plain.  French  and 
British  divisions,  put  in  on  this  front,  restored  the  situa- 
tion to  some  extent.  Then  a  belated  winter  intervened 
to  save  the  Piave  line. 

During  the  winter  months  Below's  Fourteenth  German 
Army  was  shifted  to  France.  The  Italian  armies  were 
strengthened  and  resupplied  with  artillery.  Notwith- 
standing their  favourable  position  the  Austro-Hunga- 
rians  were  reluctant  to  resume  the  attack  in  the  spring 
of  191 8.  They  preferred  to  await  the  result  of  Luden- 
dorff's  offensive  in  France.  Finally  Germany  de- 
manded action,  and  on  June  15,  1918,  Boroevic,  who 
had  succeeded  Hoetzendorff  as  Austro-Hungarian 
Commander-in-Chief,  attacked  on  the  entire  front 
— from  the  Adige  to  the  Adriatic.  The  Italian  mount- 
ain line  held  firm.  The  Piave  River  was  crossed  at 
many  points.  But  after  a  week  of  fighting,  the  Austro- 
Hungarian  attack  exhausted  itself.  The  western  bank 
of  the  Piave  was  re-cleared  of  the  enemy  and  it  was  evi- 
dent that  Austria's  force  was  spent.  Italy  had  saved 
her  last  frontier.  All  she  had  to  do  was  to  stick  it 
out  there  and  wait  for  the  end. 

The  final  Italian  offensive,  begun  on  October  24th, 
found  the  enemy  disheartened  and  clamorous  for  an 


362    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

armistice.  Before  this  was  granted  the  Italian 
armies  had  swept  back  victoriously  past  the  Livenza 
to  the  Tagliamento  and  overrun  the  Venetian  Alps 
as  far  as  Feltre  and  Belluno.  Immense  stores,  five 
hundred  thousand  prisoners,  and  five  thousand 
guns  were  captured.  The  Caporetto  disaster  was 
avenged. 

But  the  war  ended  with  the  bulk  of  the  Italian  forces 
still  in  Italian  territory.  The  limitations  imposed  by 
nature  on  Italian  military  activities  had  not  been 
overcome.  The  mountain  barriers  which  obstructed 
egress  from  the  peninsula  were  never  broken.  So  the 
problem  of  an  Italian  offensive  against  Austria  re- 
mained unsolved,  despite  two  years  of  heroic  effort  on 
the  Isonzo.  Fighting  her  own  battle,  Italy  showed  a 
high  degree  of  skill  and  courage  and  submitted  to 
enormous  sacrifices.  But  her  contribution  to  the 
military  power  of  the  Entente  (owing  to  her  fatal  lack 
of  a  true  military  frontier  and  to  the  inability  of  the 
Entente  nations  to  co-ordinate  their  strategy)  did  not 
correspond  to  her  actual  resources  or  meet  the  expecta- 
tions aroused  by  her  entry  into  the  war.  This  was 
regrettable.  But  the  fault  was  not  Italy's.  It  lay  at 
the  door  of  all  the  Entente  governments,  which,  up 
nearly  to  the  end,  put  the  wisdom  of  the  politician 
ahead  of  the  wisdom  of  the  soldier,  and  refused  to 


Italy's  Part  in  the  War  363 

recognize  the  fact  that  neither  a  league  of  nations, 
nor  an  international  war  college,  nor  an  Allied  war 
staff,  is  competent  to  conduct  an  inexorably  unified 
and  centralized  enterprise  like  war. 


CHAPTER  XIX 
ludendorff's  gamble 

Germany  closed  the  year  191 7  with  an  imposing 
military  victory.  She  opened  the  year  191 8  with  an 
amazing  diplomatic  coup.  Italy  had  almost  suffered 
the  fate  of  Serbia  and  Rumania.  Now  Russia,  without 
a  whimper,  consented  to  dismemberment.  The  treaty 
of  Brest-Litovsk,  signed  by  the  Kaiser's  Bolshevist 
confederates,  Lenine  and  Trotzky,  was  in  a  way  a 
consequence  of  the  Russian  military  collapse,  which 
had  begun  even  before  the  Revolution.  But  it  threw 
into  Germany's  lap  spoils  which  she  would  hardly  have 
dreamed  of  demanding  from  any  Muscovite  regime 
which  still  believed  in  Russia's  future  as  a  nation. 
Lenine  and  Trotzky  were  not  Russians  in  any  legitimate 
sense.  They  were  not  even  Slavs.  They  were  Marx- 
ian fanatics,  to  whom  all  nationalistic  ideals  were 
odious.  From  their  point-of-view,  the  preservation 
of  the  integrity  of  the  old  Romanoff  Empire  was  a 
matter  of  absolute  indifference. 

At    Brest-Litovsk    the    German    diplomats    gorged 

364 


Ludendorff s  Gamble  365 

themselves  without  compunction.  They  appropriated 
Finland,  the  Baltic  Provinces,  Lithuania,  Poland,  and 
the  Ukraine.  They  gave  Turkey  three  Trans-Cauca- 
sian districts — Kars,  Batum,  and  Erivan.  They  prac- 
tically annexed  Rumania,  which  was  compelled  to 
capitulate  when  Russia  did.  But  not  content  with 
the  largess  of  the  Russian  and  Rumanian  conventions, 
Germany  proceeded  to  extend  her  Eastern  holdings 
without  treaty  sanction.  She  seized  the  Crimea,  occu- 
pied the  north  shore  of  the  Black  Sea  as  far  as  Rostov- 
on-the-Don,  and  converted  both  the  Black  Sea  and  the 
Sea  of  Azov  into  German  lakes.  She  forced  the  Bol- 
shevist leaders  to  cede  Carelia  to  Finland  and  permitted 
the  Turks  to  push  across  Trans-Caucasia  to  the  Cas- 
pian and  lay  claim  to  the  port  and  district  of  Baku. 

In  February  and  March,  191 8,  the  most  spacious 
Pan-German  visions  of  a  Middle  Europe  linked  up 
with  a  Middle  Asia,  were  on  the  verge  of  realization. 
The  only  obstacle  to  complete  realization  was  the 
necessity  of  first  terminating  the  war  in  the  West. 
On  that  front  Germany  had  wilfully  complicated  the 
situation  by  dragging  in  the  United  States.  Luden- 
dorff was  now  able  to  add  one  million  men,  drawn  from 
the  Eastern  Front,  to  the  German  western  armies. 
That  reinforcement  would,  doubtless,  have  enabled 
him,  standing  on  the  defensive,  to  wear  down  France 


366    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

and  Great  Britain,  righting  disjointedly  and  unaided. 
It  might  even  have  enabled  him,  taking  the  offensive, 
to  defeat  France  and  Great  Britain,  especially  since, 
for  the  moment,  Italy  had  become  a  liability  to  the 
Entente,  instead  of  an  asset. 

But  now,  the  unrestricted  U-boat  campaign  having 
failed,  the  American  military  contribution  had  to  be 
reckoned  with.  Germany's  fight  became  a  fight  against 
the  hour  glass.  The  German  problem  was,  to  choose 
between  the  offensive  and  the  defensive.  Should 
Ludendorff  husband  his  strength  in  order  to  repel  a 
united  Allied  attack,  coming  in  the  fall  of  191 8  or  the 
spring  of  19 19,  meanwhile  atempting  to  develop  the 
reserve  man-power  of  the  new  Eastern  dependencies? 
Or  should  he  try  to  put  France  and  Great  Britain  out 
before  the  American  armies  could  arrive? 

Ludendorff  was  the  final  arbiter  at  German  Grand 
Headquarters.  In  a  speech  at  Weimar,  in  March,  1919, 
Philip  Scheidemann,  Premier  of  the  Provisional  Gov- 
ernment, denounced  the  Grand  Quartermaster  Gen- 
eral, as  a  "gambler"  or  "plunger"  (the  word  he  used 
was  a  borrowed  one,  hasardeur).  This  characteriza- 
tion fitted  the  facts.  Ludendorff  had  the  speculative 
instinct.  He  was  willing  to  stake  everything  on  a 
single  throw.  He  is  said  to  have  had  something  like 
an  altercation  with  the  Kaiser  over  the  comparative 


Ludendorff's  Gamble  367 

merits  of  his  own  venturesome  policy,  and  the  cautious 
delaying  policy  which  had  underlain  Hindenburg's 
strategy  in  the  West,  and  to  have  closed  it  with  the 
declaration:  "I  am  a  simple  soldier,  Sire,  and  my  sole 
purpose  is  to  end  the  war."  He  did  end  it — and  much 
sooner  than  anybody  expected. 

Ludendorff  made  no  secret  of  his  decision  to  attack 
in  the  spring.  On  the  contrary,  his  intentions  were 
freely  advertised.  The  Allies  had  ample  warning 
of  what  was  coming.  In  a  way  they  may  be  said  to 
have  anticipated  Ludendorff's  decision.  For  Field 
Marshal  Sir  Douglas  Haig  testifies  in  his  report  of  Oc- 
tober 21,  1918,  that  early  in  December,  191 7  (that  is, 
only  a  few  days  after  the  close  of  the  battle  of  Cambrai), 
"orders  were  issued  having  for  their  object  an  imme- 
diate preparation  to  meet  a  strong  and  sustained  hos- 
tile offensive;  in  other  words,  a  defensive  policy  was 
adopted  and  all  the  necessary  arrangements,  consequent 
thereon,  were  put  in  hand  with  the  least  possible  delay." 

This  statement  holds  good  so  far  as  concerns  the 
attitude  and  intentions  of  the  British  High  Command 
in  France.  But  its  control  of  British  resources  was 
limited.  It  would  be  extravagant  to  assume  that  the 
British  Government  had  fully  realized  the  possibilities 
of  a  German  offensive,  or  had  committed  itself  to  the 
military  arrangements  consequent  on  such  a  realiza- 


368    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

tion.  Late  in  the  winter  Bonar  Law  said  publicly:  "I 
am  sceptical  of  the  great  German  offensive. "  And  many 
of  the  British  generals  in  France  shared  his  belief. 
Philip  Gibbs,  the  British  war  correspondent,  reports 
that  shortly  before  the  German  offensive  began  he 
talked  with  thirteen  of  the  division  commanders  on 
the  St.  Quentin  front.  Only  two  of  them  thought  it 
would  materialize.     The  others  said:  "It  is  all  bluff." 

In  November,  191 7,  Premier  Lloyd  George  had  said 
in  his  Paris  speech:  "The  war  has  been  prolonged  by 
particularism;  it  will  be  shortened  by  solidarity." 
Yet  the  old  particularism  was  still  allowed  to  stand  in 
the  way  of  unified  Allied  preparation  for  the  coming 
German   onslaught. 

Ludendorff's  great  initial  success  west  of  St.  Quentin 
was  due  in  large  measure  to  the  shortcomings  of  the 
Allied  system  of  dual  military  control.  The  French 
evidently  expected  the  first  German  attack  to  be  aimed 
at  Paris,  instead  of  Amiens.  They  thought  that  it 
would  come  in  the  Rheims  sector  and  concentrated 
their  reserves  on  that  part  of  the  battle  line.  Early 
in  the  fall  of  191 7  the  French  Government  began  nego- 
tiations with  the  British  Government  for  an  extension 
of  the  British  front  in  France  from  St.  Quentin  down 
to  the  Oise  River  in  front  of  La  Fere.  This  extension 
was  agreed  to  and  was  to  take  effect  in  December.     It 


Ludendorff's  Gamble  369 

was  delayed,  however,  and  was  not  completed  until 
the  end  of  January,  1918. 

The  British  line  had  been  prolonged  twenty-eight 
miles.  But  the  British  armies  in  France,  whose  losses 
in  191 7  had  amounted  to  seven  hundred  thousand, 
had  not  been  adequately  reinforced.  Charges  to  that 
effect  were  made  in  the  spring  of  1918,  by  leading  Brit- 
ish military  critics.  The  fact  that  the  expeditionary 
divisions  were  reorganized  in  the  winter  of  191 7-' 18 
and  cut  down  from  thirteen  battalions  to  ten  battalions 
apiece — a  change  obviously  embarrassing  to  the  com- 
manders in  the  field — indicates  that  the  flow  of  replace- 
ments to  the  front  had  sensibly  decreased.  Three 
divisions  had  been  sent  to  Italy.  The  British  were, 
therefore,  hardly  strong  enough  to  risk  lengthening 
their  line. 

The  Fifth  Army,  under  General  Sir  H.  de  la  P.  Gough, 
was  assigned  to  the  twenty-eight-mile  front  taken 
over  from  the  French.  In  addition,  it  held  fourteen 
miles  of  the  old  British  line  up  to  Gouzeaucourt.  To 
guard  this  long  stretch  it  had  only  fourteen  infantry 
and  three  cavalry  divisions,  the  three  cavalry  and  three 
infantry  divisions  being  held  in  reserve.  Only  one 
division  was  allowed  to  6750  yards  of  front.  On  three 
quarters  of  the  line  the  troops  were  new  to  their  posi- 
tions.    Three   defensive   belts   were   constructed,    but 


370    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

not  finished  in  all  details.  A  strong  bridgehead  on  the 
east  bank  of  the  Somme,  covering  Peronne,  had  been 
only  partially  completed  when  the  German  onslaught 
came.  The  state  of  the  defence  was,  therefore,  far 
from  reassuring,  in  view  of  the  enormous  superiority 
in  numbers  which  the  attack  was  certain  to  develop. 

The  British  Third  Army,  under  General  Sir  G.  H.  G. 
Byng,  was  stationed  on  the  left  of  the  Fifth.  It  held 
a  much  shorter  line,  with  eight  divisions  in  the  front 
and  seven  in  reserve.  The  length  of  front  allotted  to 
each  division  was  4700  yards.  The  proportion  of 
reserves  was  twice  as  great  as  it  was  on  the  front  held 
by  the  Fifth  Army. 

The  Fifth  Army  front  presented  a  singularly  easy 
mark  to  the  enemy.  Yet  the  shortage  of  troops  there 
was  not  based  on  a  mistaken  theory  that  the  German 
blow  would  fall  elsewhere.  It  was  not  simply  a  case 
of  trusting  to  Providence.  Field  Marshal  Haig  was 
much  more  willing  to  lose  ground  in  the  south — if 
ground  had  to  be  lost  anywhere — than  on  the  Flanders 
and  Lens-Arras  fronts.  He  had  fought  all  through 
191 7  to  improve  his  positions  before  Arras  and  in  the 
Ypres  sector.  There  the  Germans  were  much  nearer 
to  important  British  bases  and  lines  of  communication. 
In  the  south,  however,  they  stood  on  ground  which  had 
been  abandoned  by   the  enemy   in   the  Hindenburg 


Ludendorff's  Gamble  37 1 

retreat  and  which  had  been  converted  into  a  desolate 
waste.  From  a  military  point-of-view  this  territory 
was  in  itself  comparatively  valueless.  Expulsion  from 
the  eastern  part  of  it  could  not  have  alarming  conse- 
quences, provided  the  German  advance  was  held  up 
at  the  line  of  the  Somme. 

The  British  had  now  adopted  the  German  zone 
system  of  defence.  Cambrai  had  demonstrated  that 
an  attack  in  great  force  could  penetrate  the  first  and 
second  positions,  and  might  easily  drive  clear  through 
the  defensive  zone.  The  British  General  Staff  had 
worked  out  a  formula,  according  to  which  the  penetra- 
tion of  a  successful  attack  would  probably  equal  half 
the  length  of  the  front  attacked  on.  But  this  formula 
presumed  a  normal  inflow  of  reserves,  which  would 
stabilize  the  defence  within  three  or  four  days. 

Byng's  new  style  of  attack  at  Cambrai  was  also 
elaborated  by  the  Germans.  They  grafted  on  it  fea- 
tures of  a  method  devised  by  General  Hutier  and 
used  with  success  in  the  East  in  the  campaign  against 
Riga.  One  of  these  features  was  an  amplification  of 
the  wave  system,  by  which  relieving  divisions  passed 
through  divisions  which  had  carried  the  attack  up  to 
a  certain  point.  Thus  the  wearied  defence  was  con- 
tinually confronted  by  fresh  assault  troops  and  the 
impetus  of  the  forward  movement  was  evenly  main- 


372    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

tained.  Special  formations  were  also  employed  to 
rush  up  the  lighter  weight  field  guns. 

This  form  of  attack  presumes  a  marked  superiority 
in  numbers.  But  it  is  always  the  privilege  of  the  offen- 
sive to  attain  such  superiority  locally.  In  the  St. 
Quentin  offensive  the  Germans  exploited  to  the  limit 
the  advantages  of  numerical  superiority.  On  a  front 
of  fifty-four  miles  they  used,  on  March  21st  alone,  a 
total  of  sixty-four  divisions.  To  oppose  these  the 
Fifth  and  Third  armies  had  only  thirty-two  divisions. 
As  the  battle  spread  north,  nine  more  German  divisions 
and  five  more  British  divisions  became  engaged.  On 
the  first  day — March  21st — according  to  Field  Marshal 
Haig's  calculations,  the  German  troops  thrown  into 
the  battle  exceeded  the  total  strength  of  the  British 
forces  in  France. 

Fortune  still  smiled  on  German  military  ventures. 
Ludendorff  had  picked  the  weakest  spot  in  the  Allied 
line  in  the  West  for  his  first  offensive.  Long  ahead 
he  had  selected  March  21st  for  the  opening  of  his 
attack.  And  that  morning  a  dense  fog  came  to  his 
assistance.  Until  1  p.m.  it  was  impossible  to  see  more 
than  fifty  yards  in  any  direction  and  the  enemy  had 
little  trouble  in  moving  unobserved  through  the  British 
forezone  and  up  to  the  midzone  battle  positions.  On 
the  greater  part  of  the  line  they  were  held  there.     But 


Ludendorff s  Gamble  373 

on  the  night  of  March  21st  the  extreme  British  right, 
opposite  La  Fere,  was  forced  to  withdraw  behind  the 
Crozat  Canal. 

The  first  real  break  came  on  March  226.,  west  of  St. 
Quentin.  There  the  German  waves  penetrated  the 
British  battle  positions  and  even  the  third  defensive 
zone.  The  50th  and  20th  divisions  of  the  Fifth  Army 
became  separated.  This  necessitated  a  retreat  to  the 
Somme  bridgehead,  east  of  Peronne,  and  a  drawing 
back  of  the  southern  divisions.  The  Fifth  Army  re- 
serves were  now  exhausted.  Rather  than  risk  an  en- 
gagement on  the  half-prepared  Somme  line,  General 
Gough  ordered  a  retirement  to  the  west  bank  of  the 
river.  On  March  23d  contact  between  the  Fifth  and 
Third  armies  was  broken  for  a  time.  German  troops 
pushed  through  the  gap  and  it  was  now  evident  that 
these  two  armies  were  unequal  to  the  task  of  re-estab- 
lishing a  line  west  of  the  Somme,  based  on  Bapaume, 
Chaulnes,  and  Roye. 

The  shortage  of  local  reserves  prevented  that  stiffen- 
ing of  the  line  which  usually  halts  a  wearied  offensive. 
The  Fifth  Army  was  practically  worn  out.  It  lost 
sixty  per  cent,  of  its  effectives  during  the  retreat.  The 
French  were  called  on  to  take  over  the  greatly  extended 
Allied  line,  running  west  from  La  Fere  to  Noyon  and 
Lassigny,  and  thence  north-north-west  past  Montdidier 


374   The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

toward  Amiens.  But  the  French  reserves  were  still 
massed  in  the  Rheims-Soissons  sector.  It  took  several 
days  to  move  them  around  to  the  Amiens  front.  Field 
Marshal  Haig  drew  heavily  on  the  Second  Army  in 
Flanders  and  also  borrowed  some  divisions  from  the 
First  Army.  But  these  also  arrived  gradually.  For  a 
while  the  only  support  in  the  rear  of  the  Fifth  Army 
was  an  improvised  division,  under  General  Carey, 
composed  of  stragglers,  details,  and  technical  troops, 
including  American  and  Canadian  engineers. 

Under  these  circumstances  a  stabilization  of  the 
shattered  front  was  impossible.  To  make  matters 
worse  the  connection  between  the  British  and  French 
forces  west  of  the  Somme  was  broken  on  March  26th. 
Nothing  was  left  to  the  Allies  but  to  continue  their 
retreat,  with  the  expectation  of  settling  down  in  a  new 
line  somewhere  to  the  west  of  Montdidier  and  in  front 
of  Amiens. 

At  this  critical  juncture — on  March  26th — Foch 
was  appointed  generalissimo  of  the  Allied  forces.  Lu- 
dendorff  had  forced  this  appointment.  In  that  way 
he  had  helped  to  neutralize  the  victories  which  the 
German  communiques  were  jubilantly  exploiting.  Ac- 
cording to  German  announcements,  Ludendorff  had 
already  captured  ninety  thousand  prisoners  and  thir- 
teen hundred  guns.     But  the  achievement  of  Allied 


Ludendorff's  Gamble  375 

unity  of  command  was  cheap  at  that  price.  Lack  of 
it  in  the  preceding  four  years  had  entailed  losses 
alongside  which  those  of  the  St.  Quentin  retreat  were 
negligible. 

By  March  28th  the  Allied  crisis  had  passed.  In  order 
to  facilitate  the  operation  against  Amiens — the  key  to 
the  communications'  system  linking  the  French  front 
with  the  British  front — Ludendorff  was  obliged  to 
reduce  the  great  northern  bastion  about  Arras.  He 
struck  along  the  Scarpe  Valley  at  the  right  of  the  British 
First  Army,  hoping  to  regain  Vimy  Ridge,  lost  in  the 
battle  of  Arras  the  year  before.  The  assault  also 
extended  well  below  Arras,  where  the  British  First 
Army  had  drawn  back  its  lines  several  miles  in  order 
to  conform  with  the  retirement  of  the  Third  Army. 

This  German  effort  was  stopped  almost  in  its  tracks. 
Its  failure  had  a  disconcerting  effect  on  the  enemy 
operations  further  south.  For  it  tended  to  stop  Ger- 
man progress  east  toward  Amiens  and  to  confine  it 
to  the  region  south  of  the  Somme,  where  the  liaison 
between  the  British  and  French  forces  was  less  gravely 
threatened.  From  March  28th  to  April  5th  the  Ger- 
mans continued  to  make  progress  south-east  of  Ami- 
ens, getting  beyond  Moreuil,  in  the  Avre  Valley.  But 
the  French  reserves  had  now  come  up  and  the  offensive 
died  away,  with  the  Germans  still  about  eight  miles 


376    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

distant  from  their  main  objective.  The  greatest  depth 
of  the  German  penetration — due  east  from  Moy,  on 
the  Oise,  to  Moreuil,  was  about  thirty-seven  miles. 

Ludendorff's  success  was  startling.  In  ten  days  he 
had  recovered  more  than  all  the  territory  lost  in  the 
battle  of  the  Somme  and  abandoned  in  the  Hindenburg 
retreat.  Though  Amiens  was  not  reached,  it  was 
brought  under  German  fire  and  reduced  to  ruins.  The 
ligature  between  the  French  and  British  armies  was 
not  severed,  but  it  hung  by  a  few  threads.  The  Ger- 
mans had  only  to  drive  down  the  Somme  Valley  to 
and  beyond  Amiens  to  put  a  broad,  bridgeless  estuary 
between  the  two  Allied  groups.  Then,  turning  north, 
they  would  be  able  to  roll  up  the  British  right  flank 
in  the  narrow  neck  of  territory  between  the  Somme  and 
the  Channel  coast.  The  loss  of  Amiens  would  have 
been  a  calamity  to  the  Allies  only  second  to  the  loss 
of  Paris  itself. 

Yet  the  front  before  Amiens  held  firm.  That  was 
because  the  French  reserves  had  now  been  shifted 
round  toward  the  apex  of  the  new  Montdidier  salient 
and  were  available  for  the  defence  of  the  Avre  Valley 
— the  easiest  German  line  of  approach  to  the  Lower 
Somme.  Having  failed  to  make  any  progress  there, 
and  being  unable  to  shake  the  British  hold  on  Arras, 
Ludendorff  now  turned  his  attention  to  Flanders.     If 


Ludendorff 's  Gamble  377 

the  British  armies  could  not  be  turned  from  the  south, 
they  might  be  turned  from  the  north,  by  a  break-through 
which  would  uncover  Dunkirk  and  Calais. 

The  second  Ludendorff  offensive  began  on  April 
9th — on  the  20-mile  sector  north  from  La  Bassee  to 
the  point  where  the  British  line  crossed  the  Comines 
Canal,  south-east  of  Ypres.  The  initial  intensity  was 
greatest  on  the  southern  half  of  the  line,  below  Armen- 
tieres,  where  the  Germans,  driving  north-west,  reached 
the  Lys  and  Lawe  rivers  within  twenty-four  hours — an 
average  advance  of  about  five  miles. 

Ludendorff  had  again  selected  a  depleted  front. 
Ten  British  divisions  had  been  withdrawn  from  the 
Flanders  battle  line  and  sent  south  to  check  the  Amiens 
drive.  They  had  been  replaced  by  divisions  of  the 
broken  Fifth  Army,  filled  up  with  drafts  hurriedly 
drawn  from  camps  in  England.  The  British  positions 
south  of  Armentieres  were  held  by  two  Portuguese 
divisions,  which  were,  to  be  relieved  on  April  ioth — 
the  day  after  the  battle  began. 

Again  fortune  favoured  the  Germans.  A  dense  fog, 
like  that  on  the  St.  Quentin  front  on  the  morning  of 
March  21st,  facilitated  the  attack.  The  Portuguese, 
taken  by  surprise,  were  greatly  hindered  in  their  re- 
sistance. Their  lines  yielded  and  the  enemy  poured 
through  toward  Estaires.     West  of  La  Bassee  the  55th 


378    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

British  division  stood  fast,  holding  Givenchy  and 
Festubert  and  covering  the  approaches  to  Bethune. 
But  the  gap  farther  north  could  not  be  closed  by  the 
few  reserves  in  hand.  On  April  ioth  the  Germans 
got  across  the  Lys,  both  at  Estaires  and  farther  east, 
and  also  developed  a  strong  attack  in  the  Messines 
sector.  Armentieres  was  in  danger  of  envelopment 
and  had  to  be  evacuated. 

In  the  succeeding  days  the  Germans  broadened  out 
their  salient  to  the  south-west  and  west,  passing  Mer- 
ville  and  reaching  the  eastern  edge  of  the  Forest  of 
Nieppe.  In  this  direction  the  greatest  German  pene- 
tration was  eight  miles.  Farther  north,  beyond  Mete- 
ren,  the  maximum  penetration  was  about  twelve  miles. 
These  results  were  in  harmony  with  the  formula  of  a 
penetration  equal  to  half  the  length  of  the  front  attacked 
on. 

The  Lys  Valley  offensive  differed  materially  from  the 
St.  Quentin  offensive  in  that  there  was  no  actual  break- 
through, except  on  the  first  day  and  that,  except  on 
that  day,  there  was  no  dislocation  of  the  British  com- 
mands. The  retirement  was  gradual  and  when  it 
slowed  down  the  Germans  found  themselves  in  a  flat 
valley  country,  commanded  on  the  north  and  north- 
west by  ridges  and  isolated  hills. 

Their  main  objectives  were  Hazebrouck  and  Ypres, 


Ludendorff  s  Gamble  379 

both  protected  by  strong  natural  obstacles.  Luden- 
dorff elected  to  try  first  for  Ypres,  because  the  fall  of 
that  city  would  compel  a  British  retirement  from  the 
big  salient  to  the  east  of  it  which  the  British  had  fought 
all  through  the  summer  and  fall  of  191 7  to  create,  and 
because  through  Poperinghe — eight  miles  west  of 
Ypres — lay  the  road  to  Dunkirk.  The  aim  of  the 
Germans  was  to  smash  through  the  line  of  hills  to  the 
south-west  of  Ypres  and  take  the  city  in  the  rear. 
This  plan  seemed  on  the  point  of  succeeding  at  various 
times  between  April  12th  and  April  21st. 

The  British  were  fighting  under  a  great  strain.  They 
were  inferior  in  numbers  and  were  hard  pressed.  Field 
Marshal  Haig  appealed  to  them  in  a  proclamation — 
issued  on  April  12th — which  almost  struck  a  note  of 
despair.  He  wrote:  "Every  position  must  be  held 
to  the  last  man.  There  must  be  no  retirement.  With 
our  backs  to  the  wall  and  believing  in  the  justice  of 
our  cause,  each  of  us  must  fight  to  the  end." 

The  painful  impression  made  by  this  proclamation 
was  heightened  by  the  interview  given  out  on  April 
17th  by  General  Sir  Frederick  Maurice,  British  Director 
of  Military  Information,  who,  after  comparing  the 
situation  to  that  at  Waterloo,  remarked: 

It  is  unpleasant  business  standing  the  hammering; 
but  so  long  as  we  can  stand  it  the  only  question  to 


380    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

be  asked  is:  "What  is  happening  to  Bliicher?     What 
has  become  of  the  reserves?" 

In  spite  of  Haig's  admonitions  the  British  had  to 
retire.  They  lost  the  Messines  Ridge,  Wytschaete, 
Neuve  Eglise,  Bailleul,  Dranoutre,  and  Meteren.  They 
had  to  abandon  almost  the  entire  salient  east  of  Ypres. 
But  the  crisis  passed  by  April  21st,  when  Blucher,  in 
the  shape  of  French  reinforcements,  had  arrived. 
French  troops  took  over  Mount  Kemmel  and  the  line 
south-west  of  it  as  far  as  Meteren. 

Mount  Kemmel,  it  is  true,  was  captured  by  the 
Germans  on  April  25th.  But  on  April  29th  Arnim's 
army,  operating  on  the  north  side  of  the  Lys  Valley 
salient,  attacked  in  force  and  was  completely  repulsed. 
After  that  it  was  never  dangerous.  On  April  18th  an 
equally  unsuccessful  general  attack  on  the  Bethune 
side  had  practically  ended  the  German  drive  in  that 
direction. 

By  the  end  of  April,  Ludendorff  had  succeeded  in 
blasting  two  formidable  salients  into  the  Allied  lines 
in  France.  But  his  real  objectives — Amiens,  Arras, 
Bethune,  Hazebrouck,  and  Ypres — had  not  been  at- 
tained. He  had  won  striking  victories.  Yet  his 
situation  was,  on  the  whole,  less  satisfactory  than  it 
had  been  on  March  21st.  On  that  date  his  armies 
slightly  outnumbered  those  of  the  Allies.     Bv  April 


Ludendorff  s  Gamble  381 

30th,  this  superiority  no  longer  existed.  The  St. 
Quentin  disaster  had  spurred  the  British  Government 
into  sending  reserves — too  long  withheld — to  France. 
Some  divisions  were  recalled  from  Palestine  and  the 
Balkans.  More  than  three  hundred  thousand  men  were 
hurried  across  the  Channel  from  England. 

The  American  movement  had  also  been  vastly  ac- 
celerated. Troops  were  crossing  the  Atlantic  at  the  rate 
of  two  hundred  thousand  a  month.  Foch's  strength 
was  rapidly  increasing.  Ludendorff's  was,  at  best,  at 
a  standstill.  He  began  asking  for  Austrian  reinforce- 
ments, but  didn't  get  any  until  late  in  the  summer. 

The  strain  of  the  offensive  was  beginning  to  tell  on 
Ludendorff.  It  took  nearly  a  month  to  prepare  his 
next  blow.  This  also  fell  on  a  sector  of  the  front  where 
a  good  deal  of  ground  could  be  lost  by  the  Allies  with- 
out compromising  the  military  situation.  The  third 
German  offensive  was  directed  against  the  Ailette 
River-Chemin  des  Dames  line,  north  of  Soissons  and 
Rheims — a  line  naturally  strong,  but  at  that  moment 
weakly  held.  The  French  had  stripped  this  sector  in 
order  to  stiffen  their  defence  of  Paris  and  Amiens. 
Five  British  divisions  had  just  been  transferred  there 
for  a  short  period  of  rest,  all  of  them  having  fought  on 
the  Somme  in  March  and  four  of  them  having  also 
fought  in  the  Lys  Valley  in  April.     They  held  the  front 


382    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

north-west  of  Rheims,  three  in  the  front  line  and  two 
in  reserve.     On  their  left  was  the  French  Sixth  Army. 

The  German  break-through  here  was  more  rapid 
and  completer  than  the  break-through  west  of  St. 
Quentin.  The  whole  Allied  line  gave  way.  The 
drive  began  on  May  27th.  In  five  days  the  Germans 
had  reached  the  Marne — thirty-one  miles  from  their 
starting  point. 

No  such  progress  could  have  been  made  if  Foch  had 
felt  obliged  to  stop  the  German  advance  at  any  cost. 
He  sent  reserves  into  action  slowly  and  sparingly, 
confining  himself  to  holding  Rheims,  on  the  east,  and 
to  checking  the  development  toward  the  west  of  the 
deep  wedge  which  Ludendorff  was  thrusting  down 
toward  the  old  Marne  battlefield.  Soissons  was  lost, 
on  May  29th.  Chateau-Thierry  was  entered  by  the 
enemy,  on  June  1st.  Thereafter  German  effort  was 
concentrated  on  a  widening  out  of  the  west  side  of  the 
salient,  running  from  a  point  on  the  Aisne,  west  of 
Soissons,  south  to  Chateau-Thierry. 

So  long  as  Foch  could  keep  his  grip  on  the  big  re- 
entrant angle,  projecting  north  of  the  Aisne  toward 
the  Oise,  and  containing  the  great  forests  which  are  the 
main  north-eastern  defence  of  Paris  (Compiegne,  Villers- 
Cotterets,  Laigue,  and  Ourscamp),  any  German  ad- 
vance below  the  Marne  would  be  distinctly  hazardous. 


Ludendorff 's  Gamble  383 

So,  in  the  first  two  weeks  in  June,  Ludendorff  sought 
persistently  to  reach  the  edges  of  Villers-Cotterets 
Forest  and  to  infiltrate  down  the  valley  of  the  Ourcq 
River,  thus  clearing  the  way  for  a  later  operation 
around  the  southern  edge  of  the  forest  region  toward 
Paris. 

In  his  first  two  offensives  Ludendorff  had  successfully 
played  the  game  which  Foch  was  to  play  later  at  his 
expense.  The  St.  Quentin  and  Lys  Valley  operations 
compelled  an  elaborate  shifting  and  reshifting  of  Allied 
troops,  thus  greatly  taxing  the  defence.  Had  Foch 
now  re- transferred  large  bodies  of  French  reserves  from 
the  Montdidier  sector  to  the  Marne  sector,  he  would 
again  have  paid  the  toll  of  conforming  his  strategy 
to  the  enemy's  and  would  also  have  inopportunely 
weakened  the  vital  Lassigny  front,  where  the  fourth 
German  blow  was  soon  to  fall.  He  wisely  preferred 
to  let  the  Marne  drive  run  its  own  course,  calling  on 
the  American  Expeditionary  Army  to  check  German 
progress  at  the  south-western  extremity  of  the  new 
wedge — the  point  nearest  to  Paris. 

Early  in  the  spring  of  191 8  four  American  divisions 
— 130,000  men — -were  ready  for  battle.  On  April 
26th  the  First  Division  had  gone  into  line  in  Picardy, 
distinguishing  itself  a  month  later  by  capturing  Can- 
tigny,   in   the    Montdidier   salient.     The   Second   and 


384    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Third  divisions  were  sent  early  in  June  to  the  Chateau- 
Thierry  sector,  where  they  helped  materially  to  stabilize 
the  Allied  line.  The  Second  captured  Bouresches, 
north-west  of  Chateau-Thierry,  on  June  6th,  gaining 
more  than  two  miles  on  a  two  and  a  half  mile  front. 
On  June  10th  it  captured  Belleau  Wood,  where  the 
marines  showed  their  mettle,  defeating  the  Prussian 
Guard.  The  Third  Division  held  the  crossings  of  the 
Marne  east  from  Chateau-Thierry  to  Jaulgonne. 

Bouresches  and  Belleau  Wood  were  the  first  real 
tests  of  the  fighting  quality  of  the  American  Expedi- 
tionary Force.  The  way  the  test  was  met  ended  all 
doubts  as  to  the  immediate  availability  of  the  American 
reinforcement.  Foch  now  had  an  ample  strategical 
reserve  in  sight,  even  for  191 8,  and  could  begin  to  plan 
a  resumption  of  the  offensive.  With  an  offensive  of 
his  own  in  view,  he  could  afford  to  observe  with  com- 
placency the  net  result  of  Ludendorff's  Aisne-Marne 
drive,  which  had  created  a  quadrilateral  pocket, 
twenty-five  miles  deep  and  twenty-five  miles  wide, 
very  hard  to  hold  and  even  harder  to  get  out  of. 

His  third  offensive  left  Ludendorff  in  a  position  in 
which  he  was  bound  to  attack  again  for  the  purpose 
of  straightening  his  lines.  The  Allied  re-entrant  angle 
west  of  Soissons  was  the  obstacle  which  he  needed 
most  to  remove.     Accordingly  he  launched  from  Las- 


Ludendorff s  Gamble  385 

signy  his  fourth  offensive,  a  logical  extension  and  con- 
tinuation of  the  third.  It  began  on  June  9th,  on  a 
front  of  about  twenty  miles  from  the  Oise  Valley, 
below  Noyon,  west  toward  Montdidier.  Compiegne 
and  the  Oise  crossings  below  that  city  were  its  object- 
ives. For  by  taking  Compiegne,  the  Allied  re-entrant 
angle  east  of  the  Oise  would  be  enveloped  on  the  west, 
just  as  it  had  already  been  enveloped  on  the  east  by 
the  drive  past  Soissons  to  the  Marne.  There  was  no 
surprise  element  in  this  attack.  Foch  was  prepared 
for  it  and  had  devised  new  tactics  to  meet  it. 

The  new  method  consisted  in  yielding  the  front  line, 
after  an  outpost  resistance,  and  meeting  the  Hutier 
waves  further  back,  when  they  had  begun  to  inter- 
mingle. The  first  experiment  with  the  new  French 
system  was  not  a  complete  success.  It  did  not  attain 
the  smoothness  which  was  to  be  shown  a  month  later 
against  the  fifth  and  last  German  offensive.  But  it 
held  the  enemy  to  a  moderate  advance  down  the  valley 
of  the  little  Matz  River.  The  climax  of  the  offensive 
was  reached  on  the  third  day.  But  on  that  day  the 
French  counter-attacked  with  great  energy,  the  enemy 
was  thrown  back  on  the  left  and  in  the  centre  and  for 
all  practical  purposes  the  drive  was  smothered.  Its 
maximum  penetration  was  only  about  six  miles. 

The  counter-attack  of  General  Mangin's  Tenth  Army 


386    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

on  June  nth  marked,  in  fact,  the  beginning  (then  hardly 
perceptible)  of  the  turn  of  the  tide  on  the  Western 
Front.  It  showed  that  Foch  had  the  strength  to 
return  blow  for  blow.  The  long  rest  which  the  French 
armies  had  enjoyed,  from  the  mid-summer  of  191 7  to 
the  spring  of  191 8,  had  restored  their  edge  and  spirit. 
The  French  military  establishment  was  at  the  height 
of  its  power.  And  it  now  had  behind  it  the  veteran 
British  armies  and  a  vast  American  reinforcement, 
ambitious,  high-strung,  eager  to  prove  its  worth  in 
battle.  With  a  little  seasoning  the  Americans  would 
equal  the  best  European  shock  troops,  as  Foch  and 
Pershing  were  about  to  prove. 

The  Hutier  assault  method  was  already  showing 
wear  and  tear.  Like  every  other  German  military 
conception  it  was  ponderous  and  complicated.  It  had 
not  gotten  away  from  the  old  German  theory  of  mass 
tactics.  Its  successful  operation  depended  on  a  smooth 
co-ordination  of  many  factors.  Each  wave  had  to 
spend  itself  and  then  allow  the  succeeding  wave  to 
pass  over  or  through.  But  if  one  wave  met  an  insu- 
perable obstruction  and  came  ebbing  back,  the  whole 
operation  fell  into  confusion. 

The  Hutier  system  had  another  grave  drawback. 
It  required  long  preparation  and  the  elaborate  train- 
ing of  specialty  shock  troops.     There  had  to  be  trying 


Ludendorffs  Gamble  387 

waits  between  offensives.  Yet  every  hour's  delay 
counted  heavily  against  Ludendorff.  Failing  south 
of  Lassigny,  the  German  High  Command  took  more 
than  thirty  days  to  stage  the  final  western  offensive. 
But  Teuton  policy  required  action  somewhere.  So 
Ludendorff  compelled  the  reluctant  Austro-Hungarian 
armies  to  strike  at  the  Italians  on  a  line  from  the  mouth 
of  the  Piave  River  to  the  upper  reaches  of  the  Brenta 
and  the  Adige.  This  southern  offensive  began  some- 
what hopefully  on  June  15th,  but  collapsed  within 
four  days  and  ended  in  a  decisive  Teuton  defeat.  After 
the  retreat  across  the  Piave,  Vienna  and  Budapest 
practically  cut  out  of  the  war.  There  was  no  real 
fight  left  in  the  governments  or  armies  of  the  Dual 
Monarchy. 

Ludendorff,  however,  still  cherished  the  illusion 
that  he  could  win  the  war  in  France.  He  vastly  under- 
estimated Foch's  resources.  Because  Paris  was  under 
the  fire  of  the  "Big  Berthas"  he  thought  that  France 
would  turn  chicken-hearted.  He  was  also  grossly 
self-deceived  about  the  value  of  the  salient  which  he 
had  created  in  the  Aisne-Marne  sector.  He  looked 
forward  to  opening  it  up  to  the  east  and  south-east, 
taking  Rheims,  the  great  bastion  of  the  Forest  of  the 
Mountain  of  Rheims,  Epernay  and  Chalons-sur-Marne, 
thus  severing  a  highly  important  line  of  communication 


388    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

between  the  Allied  armies  north-east  of  Paris  and  those 
on  the  Meuse  and  on  the  Lorraine  border.  He  never 
dreamed  that  while  he  was  trying  to  capture  Rheims 
and  Chalons,  the  exposed  western  face  of  the  Aisne- 
Marne  salient  might  be  smashed  in. 

The  fifth  German  offensive  opened  on  July  15th. 
It  was  the  culmination  of  Ludendorff's  win-all-lose-all 
plunges.  The  ultimate  coup  remained  uncompleted. 
While  Ludendorff  was  in  the  act  of  casting  the  dice, 
Foch  snatched  the  dice-box  out  of  his  hands. 


CHAPTER  XX 
foch's  victory  offensive 

The  first  four  of  the  Ludendorff  offensives  stood  out 
distinctly.  They  had  a  unity  of  character.  They 
gathered,  broke,  culminated,  and  died  away  in  the  same 
ponderously  mechanical  manner.  They  left  deep  in- 
dentations on  the  Western  battle  front.  Each  of  them 
seemed  to  carry  the  German  High  Command  consider- 
ably nearer  its  twin  objectives — possession  of  Paris 
and  the  capture  of  the  Channel  ports. 

The  fifth  offensive  differed  from  the  others.  In  scope 
it  was  the  most  grandiose  of  all.  The  front  attacked 
on  was  fifty-five  miles  long,  five  miles  longer  than  that 
before  St.  Quentin  or  Laon,  nearly  twice  as  long  as  that 
before  Lassigny  and  nearly  three  times  as  long  as  that 
before  Lille.  Masses  of  shock  troops  were  thrown  in 
lavishly.  The  latest  adaptations  and  refinements  of  the 
Hutier  assault  method  were  also  all  in  evidence. 

But,  as  in  the  case  of  Boroevic's  June  offensive  in 
Venetia,  the  energy  of  the  attack  was  too  much  dissi- 
pated.   For  the  first  time  the  brunt  of  it  did  not  fall  in 

389 


390    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

the  middle  of  a  straight  line.  No  central  breach  was 
made  into  which  there  could  be  a  flow  of  supports  from 
the  two  wings.  Nor  was  the  offensive  able  to  finish  its 
course.  After  three  days  it  was  swallowed  up  by  the 
Foch  counter-offensive.  It  had  nearly  broken  down  on 
the  second  day.  Instead  of  staging  a  climax,  Luden- 
dorff  had  staged  an  anti-climax.  There  were  two  reasons 
for  this.  By  July  15,  191 8,  German  offensive  strategy 
had  become  bankrupt  and  the  temporary  superiority 
in  man  power,  on  which  it  was  based,  had  ceased  to 
exist. 

Ludendorff's  suppressed  fifth  offensive  dovetailed 
perfectly  into  Foch's  counter-offensive.  This  was  not  a 
pure  coincidence.  Having  been  balked  in  the  attempt 
to  work  down  the  Oise  Valley  to  Compiegne,  the  Ger- 
man High  Command  naturally  turned  next  to  the 
project  of  capturing  Rheims,  Chalons  and  Epernay  and 
clearing  the  line  of  the  Marne.  It  was  relatively  easy 
to  foresee  the  direction  from  which  the  fifth  German 
blow  would  be  delivered. 

Foch  did  foresee  it.  As  a  consequence  he  was  ready 
to  meet  an  attack  everywhere  on  the  long  front  from 
Chateau-Thierry  up  past  Rheims,  and  then  east  of 
Rheims  to  Massiges.  He  was  also  ready  to  assume  the 
offensive  himself,  if  Ludendorff  should  attack  elsewhere 
or  hold  off  too  long. 


Foch's  Victory  Offensive  391 

Ludendorff  had  little  latitude  in  the  choice  of  his  new 
operating  front.  It  is  no  reflection  on  his  strategy  that 
he  made  the  choice  which  was  the  most  obvious  under 
the  circumstances  and  which  Foch  had  anticipated. 
But  it  is  a  reflection  on  the  quality  of  his  generalship 
that,  absorbed  in  his  own  plans  and  undervaluing  the 
initiative  of  his  antagonist,  he  should  have  ignored  the 
possibility  of  an  Allied  operation  against  the  exposed 
west  side  of  the  Aisne-Marne  salient. 

This  front  was  especially  vulnerable  because  a  con- 
centration against  it  could  easily  be  concealed.  The  big 
forest  of  Villers-Cotterets  adjoined  it  on  the  west  and 
further  to  the  west  lay  the  bigger  forest  of  Compiegne. 
In  the  shelter  of  these  coverts  Foch  had  gathered 
together  a  force  to  be  used,  when  opportunity  should 
favour,  for  an  attack  on  the  German  line  from  Soissons 
south  to  Chateau-Thierry. 

Ludendorff  was  unaware  of  the  existence  of  this  con- 
centration and  did  not  in  the  least  suspect  Foch's  in- 
tentions. Yet  Foch  gave  him  a  certain  warning.  If 
he  had  been  keenly  observant  he  would  have  noted,  and 
correctly  interpreted,  the  numerous  nibbling  operations 
conducted  by  the  French  to  the  east  and  north-east  of 
Villers-Cotterets  Forest  in  the  last  two  wreeks  in  June 
and  the  first  two  weeks  in  July.  Foch  was  continually 
advancing   the  French  line,   acquiring   "elbow  room" 


392    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

and  seizing  advantageous  "jumping  off"  points  for  an 
attack.  Meanwhile  he  had  quietly  transferred  Mangin's 
Tenth  Army  from  the  Lassigny  sector  to  the  sector 
west  of  Soissons  and  reinforced  it  with  the  First  and 
Second  American  divisions. 

Foch  knew  that  Ludendorff  must  strike  again  before 
August  ist  or  confess  failure.  So  he  bided  his  time. 
Ludendorff  selected  July  15th  because  July  14th  was 
Bastille  Day  and  there  was  a  remote  chance  that  the 
French  might  relax  their  vigilance  a  little  while  cele- 
brating it.  But  the  French  information  service  had  the 
attack  scheduled  to  the  hour.  On  the  main  front — 
east  of  Rheims,  where  there  had  been  no  serious  fighting 
since  the  fall  of  191 5 — General  Gouraud  drew  back 
from  his  first  line  positions,  soaked  them  with  gas  and 
took  the  advancing  German  waves  under  fire  from 
battle  positions  a  couple  of  miles  back.  There  was  no 
sign  of  even  a  moderate  break-through,  like  that  below 
Lassigny.  The  German  assault  was  stopped  in  its 
tracks.  Ludendorff  had  gone  to  the  well  once  too  often 
with  the  Hutier  method. 

The  Allied  defence  of  the  loop  which  encircled  Rheims 
was  equally  firm.  Rheims,  the  city,  was  only  a  glorious 
memory.  It  could  have  been  yielded  under  stress,  as 
Soissons  had  been  yielded  at  the  end  of  May.  The 
position  of  real  value  in  this  sector  was  the  Forest 


Foch's  Victory  Offensive  393 

of  the  Mountain  of  Rheims — a  few  miles  south — which 
not  only  dominated  Rheims  but  barred  the  road  toward 
Epernay.  But  Foch  needed  to  hold  fast  on  the  whole 
eastern  side  of  the  Aisne-Marne  quadrilateral  in  order 
to  reap  the  full  benefits  of  his  breaking-through  opera- 
tion on  the  west  side. 

He  could  well  afford,  however,  to  encourage  the  Ger- 
mans to  cross  to  the  south  bank  of  the  Marne  between 
Chateau-Thierry  and  Dormans  and  also  to  deepen  the 
Aisne-Marne  pocket  to  the  south-east  in  the  direction 
of  Epernay.  Evidently  he  did  accelerate  German  pro- 
gress in  those  directions.  On  July  15th  the  enemy 
crossed  the  Marne  in  force  and  penetrated  about  four 
miles  up  the  valley  of  the  little  Surmelin  River,  toward 
Conde.  They  held  an  irregular  salient  on  the  south 
bank  for  about  five  days.  The  French  also  readily 
yielded  ground  further  east.  There  the  Germans  drove 
a  wedge  five  or  six  miles  deep,  on  both  banks  of  the 
river,  to  the  edge  of  the  Forest  of  Epernay. 

By  July  1 8th  the  main  German  effort  had  been  con- 
centrated in  the  south-eastern  corner  of  the  Aisne- 
Marne  salient — just  where  it  suited  Foch  best  to  have  it 
concentrated.  So  on  the  morning  of  that  day  the 
Franco-American  attack  on  the  Soissons-Chateau- 
Thierry  side  of  the  Marne  quadrilateral  was  unleashed. 
It  represented  the  first  materialization  of  the  Allied 


394    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

"strategic  reserve.  "  Foch  was  popularly  credited  with 
having  collected  such  a  reserve  even  before  he  became 
generalissimo.  But  its  existence,  prior  to  June,  191 8, 
was  probably  largely  mythical.  If  Foch  had  possessed 
a  real  "strategic  reserve"  at  the  time  of  the  German 
drive  for  Amiens,  he  would  hardly  have  failed  to  em- 
ploy it  then,  when  it  looked  as  if  the  liaison  between  the 
French  and  the  British  armies  was  about  to  be  broken. 
At  that  time  LudendorfT  pooh-poohed  Foch's  reserve. 
The  mistake  he  made  was  in  pooh-poohing  it  three 
months  later,  after  one  million  American  soldiers  were 
on  French  soil  and  more  than  three  hundred  thousand — 
including  the  technical  services — were  ready  for  use  at 
the  Front. 

Foch's  blow  took  LudendorfT  absolutely  by  surprise. 
It  was  also  like  a  bolt  out  of  a  clear  sky  to  the  Allied 
publics.  They  had  hardly  begun  to  recover  from  the 
enormous  depression  of  the  spring  and  early  summer 
and  still  looked  on  an  Allied  resumption  of  the  offensive 
as  a  remote  contingency.  The  meaning  of  the  opera- 
tion was  curiously  misunderstood  at  first.  Many  mili- 
tary critics  discussed  it  as  a  mere  counter-attack, 
intended  to  relieve  German  pressure  on  the  eastern  and 
south-eastern  parts  of  the  Aisne-Marne  salient. 

But  this  was  to  misread  Foch's  character.  He  had 
the    aggressive    temperament.      He    had    persistently 


Foch's  Victory  Offensive  395 

lauded  the  offensive  as  the  surest  and  most  economical 
method  of  attaining  military  results.  It  was  certain 
that  he  would  return  to  it  suddenly,  dramatically,  and 
at  the  earliest  practicable  moment.  It  seemed  entirely 
clear  to  me  when  the  first  bulletins  of  the  fighting  came 
in,  on  the  afternoon  of  July  18th,  that  in  a  few  hours 
the  whole  character  of  the  war  on  the  Western  Front 
had  been  transformed.  I  wrote  on  the  evening  of 
July  1 8th  ("Military  Comment,"  New  York  Tribune, 
July  19,  1918): 

It  is  no  longer  a  Ludendorff  offensive.  Foch  has 
intervened.  He  has  started  an  offensive  of  his  own. 
He  is  attempting  to  snatch  the  initiative  out  of  Luden- 
dorff's  hands.  It  looks  now  as  if  he  had  succeeded 
in  doing  so.  .  .  .  Foch's  attack  marks  a  revolution- 
ary change  of  policy.  It  is  the  turning  point  in  Allied 
strategy  for  191 8.  The  Allied  armies  in  France  no 
longer  stand  at  bay.  They  have  turned  on  the  enemy. 
The  vigour  and  confidence  with  which  Foch  inter- 
rupted his  defence  and  struck  at  the  Germans  on  a 
new  field  are  evidence  enough  that  he  no  longer  feels 
under  the  necessity  of  husbanding  his  strength  and  of 
yielding  territory  in  preference  to  involving  his  re- 
serves too  deeply  in  what  might  develop  into  a  pre- 
mature finish  fight.   .   .  . 

The  great  significance  of  the  Franco-American 
drive  at  the  German  right  flank  in  the  Aisne-Marne 
region  lies,  therefore,  in  the  fact  that  it  was  a  new 
departure.  It  was  not  a  counter-attack.  It  was  a 
counter-offensive. 


39°    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

It  turned  out  to  be  exactly  that — the  first  of  the 
series  of  blows  under  which  the  German  armies  in 
France  and  Belgium  were  to  recoil,  wilt,  and  finally  be 
reduced  to  begging  for  an  armistice.  It  was  a  notice  to 
LudendorfT  that  he  had  lost  his  gamble.  But  Luden- 
dorff  closed  his  eyes  and  ears  to  the  notice.  Bred  in  the 
General  Staff  tradition  of  Prussian  military  infallibility, 
he  refused  to  recognize  that  his  offensive  was  over 
and  that  Germany's  only  hope  of  carrying  the  war 
to  a  draw  lay  in  an  immediate  return  to  a  wary  and 
economical  defensive. 

His  own  pride  of  opinion  revolted  at  such  an  ad- 
mission and  he  was  also  able  to  excuse  himself  from 
making  it  on  the  ground  that  it  would  throw  the  Ger- 
man civilian  population  into  a  panic.  He  recalled  his 
divisions  from  beyond  the  Marne  after  the  first  news  of 
the  Franco-American  successes  west  of  Soissons  and 
north-west  of  Chateau-Thierry  reached  him.  But  he 
sought  to  camouflage  to  the  Germans  the  sensational 
change  which  the  military  situation  had  undergone 
by  unduly  prolonging  his  stay  in  the  Aisne-Marne 
salient,  which  it  was  now  foolhardy  for  him  to  try  to 
hold. 

The  shape  of  the  salient  was  such  that  when  the  weak 
west  side  gave  way  all  the  rest  became  worthless  for 
Ludendorff's  purposes.     An  Allied  advance  north-west 


Foch's  Victory  Offensive  397 

from  Chateau-Thierry  to  the  Ourcq  River  and  west 
from  the  Villers-Cotterets  region  to  Fere-en-Tardenois 
would  inevitably  squeeze  out  the  rest  of  the  pocket. 
There  would  not  be  room  left  in  it  for  free  north-and- 
south  communications  and  the  fact  that  Ludendorff 
had  overpacked  it  with  troops  and  overstocked  it  with 
munitions  and  supplies  for  the  drive  toward  Epernay, 
made  a  speeded-up  evacuation  all  the  more  necessary. 

Ludendorff  lingered,  however.  He  used  up  many 
divisions  delaying  the  fall  of  Soissons  and  Fere-en- 
Tardenois.  And  this  was  done  not  so  much  for  the 
sake  of  extricating  German  war  material  as  it  was  to 
foster  the  illusion  that  the  German  retirement  was  a 
trifling  strategic  incident,  purely  voluntary  and  involv- 
ing no  change  in  German  policy.  So  the  Germans 
stopped  longer  than  they  should  have  stopped  at  the 
Ourcq,  and  on  the  "new  lines"  between  the  Ourcq 
and  the  Vesle,  so  conspicuously  advertised  as  "per- 
manent" in  the  German  communiques.  They  tried  to 
hold  the  Vesle,  instead  of  retreating  outright  to  the 
Aisne  and  the  Chemin  des  Dames.  They  did,  in  fact, 
hold  the  enclave  between  the  Vesle  and  the  Aisne  for 
many  weeks. 

But  all  this  was  "window-dressing" — from  the  mili- 
tary point-of-view.  After  his  right  wing  was  broken  on 
the  Soissons-Chateau-Thierry  front  Ludendorff's  first 


398    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

duty  as  a  strategist  was  to  draw  his  armies  out  of  all 
the  exposed  salients  in  which  he  had  planted  them  and 
to  bring  them  back  to  the  far  shorter  and  safer  Hinden- 
burg  Line.  But  this  he  was  too  self-willed  and  too  petu- 
lant to  do.  He  lacked  the  unsparing  clarity  of  vision  and 
intellectual  candour  of  the  really  great  soldier. 

Ludendorff's  besetting  failure  in  the  last  four  and 
a  half  months  of  the  war  was  his  inability  to  look  at  the 
facts  squarely  and  without  rancour.  He  continued  to 
allow  his  military  operations  to  be  influenced  by  poli- 
tical considerations  and  personal  interests.  By  so 
doing  he  greatly  facilitated  Foch's  task.  This  was  to 
push,  squeeze,  elbow,  and  shoulder  the  German  armies 
out  of  France,  disintegrating  them  in  the  process.  His 
method  of  pressure  was  the  reverse  of  Ludendorff's,  the 
reverse  of  Falkenhayn's,  the  reverse  of  Joffre's.  Foch 
didn't  depend  on  ponderous,  high-geared  offensives  of 
the  Hutier  type.  He  didn't  favour  long  reposes  be- 
tween offensives.  He  maintained  an  operative  front  of 
one  hundred,  one  hundred  and  fifty,  or  two  hundred 
miles,  whereas  his  predecessors  had  maintained  opera- 
tive fronts  of  fifteen,  thirty,  or  fifty  miles.  He  didn't 
blast  and  crunch  his  way  forward  over  restricted  areas 
as  the  Germans  did  at  Verdun.  Nor  did  he  "nibble," 
as  Joffre  did  in  191 5,  with  minute  territorial  objectives 
and  long  intervals  between  the  attacks.     He  preferred 


Foch's  Victory  Offensive  399 

to  distribute  his  effort  evenly  and  to  make  it  practically 
continuous. 

This  new  method  was  made  practicable  by  the  nearly 
complete  return  of  the  warfare  of  movement.  It  was 
also  especially  adapted  to  the  strategic  situation  with 
which  Foch  had  to  deal.  His  objective  was  no  longer 
primarily  the  recovery  of  French  territory.  It  was  the 
destruction  of  the  German  Army.  To  wear  down  that 
army,  now  seriously  weakened  and  further  handicapped 
by  being  thrown  suddenly  on  the  defensive,  was  his 
single  purpose.  An  army  in  modern  days  is  no  stronger 
than  its  reserves.  And  the  easiest  way  to  exhaust  the 
German  reserves  was  by  shifting  and  varying  the  attack, 
imposing  on  the  enemy  the  constant  burden  of  hurrying 
reinforcements  from  one  sector  to  another.  The  Allies 
had  felt  the  weight  of  this  burden  after  the  German 
drives  from  St.  Quentin,  from  Lille,  and  from  Laon. 
Now  it  was  to  become  a  nightmare  to  Ludendorff. 

By  August  8th  the  Aisne-Marne  salient  had  been 
cleared  up  to  and  a  little  beyond  the  Vesle  River.  This 
left  Ludendorff  with  three  more  salients  on  his  hands — 
the  big  Montdidier  one,  the  smaller  Lys  Valley  one,  and 
the  still  smaller  one  south  of  Lassigny.  They  all  offered 
tempting  marks  to  an  Allied  commander-in-chief.  To 
stay  in  those  salients  until  attacked  at  a  disadvantage 
was  military  folly.     But  Ludendorff  was  ashamed  to 


400    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

retire  out  of  any  of  them — even  though  he  had  the  as- 
surance to  say  in  exculpation  of  his  ejection  from  the 
Marne  salient:  "We  left  the  abandoned  ground  to  the 
enemy  according  to  our  regular  plan.  'Gain  of  ground' 
and  'Marne'  are  only  catchwords,  without  importance 
for  the  issue  of  the  war. " 

Moreuil,  Montdidier,  the  Lassigny  Massif,  Bailleul 
and  Kemmel  may  also  have  been  only  "catchwords," 
from  the  point-of-view  of  Ludendorfl,  the  student  of  the 
art  of  war.  But  as  a  commander  in  the  field  he  held 
on  to  them  long  after  an  abandonment  "according  to 
our  regular  plan"  had  become  advisable. 

Already  in  the  last  half  of  July  Foch  had  undertaken 
some  trying-out  operations  north  of  Montdidier  which 
foreshadowed  an  offensive  in  that  quarter.  But  the 
German  High  Command  was  again  unobservant.  The 
Franco-British  attack  south  of  the  Somme  broke  on 
August  8th.  A  couple  of  days  before  that  General 
Ardenne,  one  of  the  favoured  elucidators  of  Grand 
Headquarters  strategy,  had  written  in  the  Berliner 
Tageblatt: 

"The  German  offensive  has  suffered  an  unpleasant 
interruption,  but  it  will  certainly  revive.  And  what 
will  contribute  to  its  revival  is  the  fact  that  the  armies 
between  the  Aisne  and  the  Marne  were  able  to  carry 
on  their  operations  with  their  own  reserves,  without 
being  obliged  to  draw  upon  the  other  reserves,  the 


Foch's  Victory  Offensive  401 

unrestricted  possession  of  which  secures  the  initiative 
to  the  German  supreme  Command." 

Probably  Ludendorff  had  likewise  hypnotized  him- 
self into  this  complacent  belief.  He  said  in  his  book  of 
reminiscences,  written  after  the  war,  that  he  did  not 
lose  hope  of  military  victory  until  after  the  collapse  of 
the  Montdidier  salient.  The  offensive  of  August  8th 
caught  his  generals  there  asleep.  The  Allied  forces  on 
the  first  day  made  an  advance  of  eight  miles  and  a  half, 
taking  one  hundred  guns,  and  seven  thousand  prisoners. 
The  German  front  lines  simply  melted  away.  Within 
four  days  the  armies  of  Hutier  and  Marwitz — the  vic- 
tors of  the  battle  of  St.  Quentin— had  lost  forty  thou- 
sand prisoners  and  three  hundred  guns  and  were  back  on 
the  rim  of  the  old  Noyon  salient  of  191 4-1 91 6. 

Ludendorff  now  repeated  the  mistake  he  had  made 
below  the  Aisne.  He  grew  irritable  and  captious.  He 
wanted  to  turn  and  strike  back  at  Foch  and  he  squan- 
dered many  divisions  in  counter-attacks  which  had  no 
strategical  justification.  Some  of  them  may  have  been 
necessary  to  facilitate  the  extrication  of  troops  and 
material.  But  this  extrication  ought  to  have  been 
already  under  way  long  before  August  8th. 

Ludendorff  finally  elected  to  make  a  real  stand  on  the 

old  Noyon  front  instead  of  cutting  losses  and  getting 

back  to  comparative  safety  behind  the   Hindenburg 
26 


402    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

Line.  This  was  the  decisive  error  of  his  military  policy. 
It  entangled  him  helplessly  in  Foch's  net. 

The  real  German  problem  on  the  West  Front  after 
July  1 8th  was  this.  The  offensive  was  lost  and  there 
was  practically  no  chance  of  recovering  it.  On  what  line 
then  must  the  German  defence  crystallize?  Hinden- 
burg's  foresight  had  given  the  Germans  one  incompar- 
ably strong  position  in  France.  It  lay  miles  back  of  the 
fronts  on  which  the  tide  of  battle  had  turned  against 
the  Germans.  There  was  ample  time  to  rally  behind  it. 
Every  military  consideration  favoured  rallying  behind 
it.  Open  warfare  had  reached  the  stage  at  which  no  line 
could  be  held  rigidly  and  absolutely.  The  defending 
infantry  could  maintain  itself  only  by  being  always 
equal  to  the  demands  of  a  counter-attack.  So  the 
soundest  policy  for  a  defence  which  hoped  to  stabilize 
itself  was  to  occupy  the  strongest  possible  defensive 
zone  available,  to  bring  the  troops  into  it  unexhausted 
and  confident,  and  to  expend  no  effort  in  counter-at- 
tacks except  that  necessary  in  order  to  repair  breaches 
in  this  primary  line.  It  was  easier  for  the  Germans  to 
hold  fast  in  the  Hindenburg  positions  than  in  any 
others.  Why,  then,  take  chances  by  holding  fast  in 
the  others? 

This  problem  and  the  great  danger  involved  in  Luden- 
dorff's  irascible  and  irresolute  handling  of  it  were  set 


Foch's  Victory  Offensive  4°3 

forth  fully  in  my  "Military  Comment"  in  the  New- 
York  Tribune,  while  the  Germans  were  still  clinging  to 
the  Bray-Chaulnes-Roye-Noyon  line.  I  quote  from 
the  Tribune  of  August  27,  191 8: 

When,  on  July  18th,  Foch  snatched  the  initiative 
out  of  Ludendorff's  hands,  the  latter  undoubtedly 
believed  that  the  Allied  offensive  would  be  similarly 
broken  and  spasmodic  (like  his  own).  He  counted 
on  being  able  to  get  back  easily  to  a  fairly  good  de- 
fensive line  and  on  being  allowed  to  remain  there  in 
comparative  tranquillity  until  he  could  adjust  him- 
self to  the  changed  military  situation.  Hence, 
perhaps,  his  unreadiness  to  make  a  quick  and  eco- 
nomical retirement.  He  clung  obstinately  to  the  illu- 
sion that  he  could  probably  soon  recover  the  offensive ; 
and  as  a  result  he  submitted  to  excessive  losses  in 
men  and  material  trying  to  hold  positions  valuable 
for  future  offensive  projects,  but  worthless  and  peril- 
ous to  armies  compelled  to  defend  themselves. 

Foch's  aggressive  strategy  has  not  imitated 
Ludendorff's.  It  is  not  spasmodic,  but  smoothly 
continuous.  It  consists  in  exerting  pressure  along  a 
very  broad  front  and  striking  successively  and  rapidly 
at  points  where  the  defence  seems  to  be  flabbiest. 
Ludendorff  ignored  his  opportunity  to  retire  cheaply 
and  in  a  more  or  less  leisurely  manner.  Now  Foch's 
strategy  keeps  him  from  retiring  at  all,  except  under 
conditions  which  involve  great  risks  and  heavy 
penalties.  He  is  closely  beset  on  the  entire  front 
from  Arras  to  Rheims.  If  he  yields  too  much  at  any 
point,  his  whole  line  is  in  jeopardy. 

The    Germans    are  paying  again  and    again    the 


4°4    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

penalty  of  having  grossly  underestimated  Foch's 
generalship  and  the  fighting  strength  of  the  Allies. 
Ludendorff's  whole  western  campaign  went  to  wreck 
when  he  assumed  that  he  could  break  the  fighting 
spirit  of  the  enemy  before  September.  Now  the 
•fighting  spirit  of  his  own  troops  is  failing  and  he  is 
tasting  about  anxiously  for  a  defensive  position  on 
which  he  can  hold  the  Allies  until  the  winter  season 
sets  in. 

Will  that  position  be  the  famous  Hindenburg 
Line?  It  may  not  be.  And  for  this  reason.  With 
the  system  of  non-rigid  defence  which  is  now  followed, 
a  line  is  only  a  line,  whatever  imposing  name  you 
may  give  it.  The  Hindenburg  Line  is  merely  a  belt 
or  a  zone — not  a  stiff,  impregnable  barrier.  No  line 
can  be  held  now  except  by  troops  which  have  the 
stamina,  resolution,  and  numbers  to  mend  it  by 
counter-attacks  when  it  is  broken.  It  is  a  question 
not  of  trenches  or  natural  obstructions,  but  of  in- 
fantry of  sufficient  strength  and  quality. 

When  he  got  back  to  the  Hindenburg  Line  in  Sep- 
tember, Ludendorff  couldn't  hold  it — formidable  as  it 
was — because  he  had  already  sacrificed  his  best  chance 
of  holding  it.  He  had  lost  two  hundred  thousand  pris- 
oners and  twenty-five  hundred  guns  on  the  way  back. 
Division  after  division  had  been  used  up  fruitlessly 
counter-attacking  on  the  Ourcq,  on  the  Ailette,  at 
Noyon,  at  Lassigny,  at  Roye,  at  Chaulnes,  at  Bapaume, 
all  of  them  of  value  only  as  "one-night-stand  "  positions 
in  a  retreat  to  the  real  German  bastion  in  France. 


Foch's  Victory  Offensive  405 

The  Queant-Drocourt  switch  of  the  Hindenburg  Line 
was  smashed  by  the  British  First  Army  on  September 
2d.  That  was  a  sufficient  portent  of  the  fate  of  the 
rest  of  the  line.  The  Queant-Drocourt  extension  was 
completely  broken  through  in  a  single  day's  fighting. 
The  positions  were  no  stronger  than  the  infantry  de- 
fending them.  And  Field  Marshal  Haig  in  his  final 
report  repeatedly  notes  the  low  morale  of  large  sections 
of  Ludendorff's  army,  broken  and  depressed  by  the 
slow  and  costly  retirement  from  the  forefront  of  the 
Albert-Montdidier  salient  to  the  shelter  of  the  Hinden- 
burg Line. 

Ludendorff  got  settled  in  the  Hindenburg  positions 
about  the  middle  of  September.  This  was  at  least  a 
month  too  late.  He  was  fairly  well  established  at  the 
southern  end  of  the  line — that  from  Moy  through  La 
Fere,  around  the  St.  Gobain  Forest  and  via  the  Chemin 
des  Dames  to  the  Aisne.  There  his  retreat  had  never 
been  seriously  impeded.  But  on  the  vital  Cambrai- 
St.  Quentin  front  his  situation  was  far  from  secure.  He 
had  not  sufficient  reserves  in  that  sector  to  stop  a  really 
determined  attack.  And  once  the  Hindenburg  Line 
caved  in  anywhere  between  Cambrai  and  St.  Quentin, 
Germany's  grip  on  France  and  Belgium  had  been 
shaken  loose. 

Foch's  strategy  from  September  on  was  exceedingly 


406    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

simple.  The  German  armies  were  spread  from  Flanders 
south-east  to  Alsace.  They  constituted  two  geographi- 
cal groups,  the  northern  based  on  Aix-la-Chapelle  and 
Cologne,  the  southern  on  Metz  and  Mayence.  The 
Belgian  Ardennes  would  intervene  to  separate  them, 
should  the  northern  group  be  driven  back  to  the  line  of 
the  Meuse  in  Belgium  Such  a  retirement  would  cost 
the  northern  group  its  lateral  communications  with  the 
southern  group — the  railroads  which  come  north  from 
Mezieres  through  Maubeuge  to  Valenciennes  and  Lille. 
The  British  armies  were  to  break  through  the  Hinden- 
burg  Line  and  advance  to  Maubeuge,  thus  isolating  the 
Germans  in  Western  Belgium.  American  and  French 
divisions  were  to  drive  north  from  Verdun  to  Sedan, 
absolutely  cutting  the  connection  between  the  northern 
and  southern  German  Armies.  Then  there  would  be  no 
safety  for  the  Germans  anywhere  west  of  the  Rhine. 

Ludendorff  had  not  grasped  the  strategy  of  Foch's 
operation  on  the  west  side  of  the  Aisne-Marne  salient. 
Possibly  he  didn't  now  clearly  grasp  the  strategy  of  the 
latter's  great  closing-in  operation.  He  remained  un- 
certain and  bewildered.  He  again  defended  unessential 
portions  of  his  line  too  long,  instead  of  husbanding  his 
strength  for  use  in  the  critical  sectors.  Thus  he  held  on 
to  Laon  after  it  had  become  as  valueless  as  Noyon  or 
Roye. 


Foch's  Victory  Offensive  407 

What  he  could  not  help  having  pressed  home  on  him 
was  that  he  needed  always  reserves  and  more  reserves — 
and  didn't  have  them.  Foch  had  done  him  out  of  his 
surplus  before  the  crisis  of  the  war  arrived.  He  evacu- 
ated the  Lys  Valley  salient  and  stripped  the  Belgian 
front.  Yet  he  never  had  enough  spare  divisions  to 
throw  in  against  the  British  opposite  Cambrai  and  St. 
Quentin  and  the  Americans  and  French  in  the  Argonne 
sector. 

The  Hindenburg  Line  was  completely  broken  in  the 
last  days  of  September  and  the  first  days  of  October. 
Then  an  advance  into  Belgium  was  made  and  Lille  was 
evacuated.  Laon  fell  and  LudendorfT  drew  back  on 
the  Oise-Aisne  front.  The  American  offensive  in  the 
Meuse  region  began  on  September  26th  and  continued 
almost  uninterruptedly  until  the  armistice  was  signed. 

LudendorfT  was  satisfied  in  October  that  he  had  lost 
the  war.  True  to  Prussian  military  instincts,  he  de- 
manded that  the  German  Civil  Government  sue  for 
term0  Prince  Max  of  Baden,  the  Imperial  Chancellor, 
acted  as  Ludendorff's  mouthpiece.  And,  in  order  to 
save  the  reputation  of  the  General  Staff,  the  plea  for 
peace  was  represented  as  coming  from  the  German 
public,  which  was  said  to  be  anxious  to  repudiate  its 
false  leaders  and  eager  to  turn  to  the  ideals  of  freedom 
and  democracy. 


4o8    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

The  General  Staff  staged  both  the  Kaiser's  abdica- 
tion and  the  German  revolution.  It  was  their  way  of 
falsifying  the  record.  Ludendorff 's  apologists  will  doubt- 
less say  that  he  favoured  an  armistice  because  the  Ger- 
man civilian  population  deserted  him  and  a  part  of  the 
army  had  become  undependable  and  unruly. 

But  that  tells  only  a  small  fraction  of  the  truth. 
Ludendorff  sought  terms  equivalent  to  surrender 
because  he  knew  that  he  could  neither  keep  the  German 
armies  in  France  and  Belgium  or  get  them  back  into 
Germany.  It  is  admitted  by  the  Germans  themselves 
that  toward  the  end  of  October  the  German  armies 
were  retreating  toward  the  line  of  Antwerp-Brussels- 
Namur-Diedenhofen-Metz.  In  the  Frankfurter  Zei- 
tung  of  January  26,  1919,  Major  Paulus,  a  German 
military  critic,  frankly  acknowledged  that  when  Luden- 
dorff was  forced  to  retire  to  an  Antwerp-Brussels- 
Namur  line,  he  was  beaten  and  "finally  beaten." 

General  Freytag-Loringhoven  entered  a  mild  dis- 
claimer to  this  statement.  But  Freytag  is  an  interested 
critic.  What  Major  Paulus  says  is  true.  Lieutenant- 
Colonel  Frederick  Palmer,  Chief  Censor  of  the  American 
Army  in  France,  reports  that  when  Marshal  Foch  read 
the  Berlin  communique  acknowledging  that  on  Nov- 
ember 1st  the  Americans  had  at  last  broken  clear 
through  the  German  lines  in  the  Argonne  sector  and 


Foch's  Victory  Offensive  409 

were  on  the  outskirts  of  Sedan,  he  allowed  himself  his 
first  outburst  of  emotion  since  the  opening  of  the  Vic- 
tory Offensive.  Foch  knew  that  with  Sedan  in  his 
possession  the  German  armies  could  not  escape.  Lu- 
dendorff  knew  so,  too. 

The  German  theory  of  a  peace  by  accommodation, 
made  in  the  absence  of  a  military  decision,  may  survive 
and  be  bolstered  up  by  an  apochryphal  literature.  But 
it  is  a  mere  subterfuge.  Set  against  it  the  fact  that  the 
German  General  Staff  accepted  the  penalties  of  defeat, 
while  Germany  was  still  in  possession  of  tens  of  thou- 
sands of  square  miles  of  Allied  territory,  when  her  own 
soil  was  intact  except  for  a  tiny  sliver  of  Alsace,  and 
when  at  least  three  million  of  her  soldiers  stood  on 
enemy  soil.  The  German  capitulation  was  unique  in 
scope  and  circumstances.  And  the  circumstances  were 
more  suggestive  of  a  desire  to  escape  punishment  than 
they  were  of  any  penitent  transformation  in  German 
politics  and  character. 

The  Allies  ended  the  war  victoriously  in  Palestine, 
in  Mesopotamia,  in  Macedonia,  in  Venetia,  and  on  the 
Western  Front.  It  was  a  triumph  of  unified  strategy — 
a  swift  and  brilliant  vindication  of  Foch's  appointment 
as  generalissimo.  In  less  than  seven  months  the  Allies 
had  accomplished  more  in  a  military  sense  than  they 
had  accomplished  in  the  preceding  forty-four  months. 


4Jo    The  Strategy  of  the  Great  War 

There  is  a  striking  parallel  between  the  closing  period 
of  the  World  War  and  the  American  Civil  War.  Up  to 
the  end  of  1863  the  North  had  made  little  effective  use 
of  its  superior  resources.  Authority  was  dispersed. 
There  was  no  centralization  of  command,  no  common 
plan  of  action  for  the  eastern  and  western  fronts.  The 
President,  the  Secretary  of  War,  the  Major- General 
nominally  commanding  the  armies  from  a  desk  in  the 
Secretary  of  War's  office,  all  interfered  with  the  generals 
in  the  field.  There  was  a  multiplication  of  independent 
military  departments.  The  war  was  conducted  in 
accordance  with  the  circuitous  methods  of  civil  govern- 
ment and  politics.  After  many  bitter  lessons  President 
Lincoln  recognized  the  absurdity  of  this  policy.  He 
made  Grant  commander-in-chief  and  relieved  him  ab- 
solutely of  the  handicap  of  dictation  from  Washington. 
"The  particulars  of  your  plan  I  neither  know  nor  seek 
to  know,  "  he  wrote  to  Grant  on  April  30,  1864.  "You 
are  vigilant  and  self-reliant ;  and  I  am  pleased  with  this. 
I  wish  not  to  obtrude  any  constraints  or  restraints  on 
you." 

"It  was  not  until  after  both  Gettysburg  and  Vicks- 
burg, "  said  General  William  T.  Sherman,  "that  the 
war  professionally  began."  The  Allied  Governments 
were  even  slower  than  Lincoln  in  learning  one  of  the 
most  obvious  of  military  lessons.     That  was  the  great 


Foch's  Victory  Offensive  411 

tragedy  of  the  war  on  their  side.  They  conducted  the 
struggle  for  nearly  four  years  more  or  less  unprofession- 
ally.  They  had — at  least  after  191 7 — resources  greatly 
superior  to  Germany's.  But  they  had  to  conquer  their 
own  separatist  tendencies  before  they  could  conquer 
the  enemy. 

Foch's  strategy  as  generalissimo  was  almost  without  a 
flaw.  After  he  arrived  the  laurels  of  the  German  com- 
manders-in-chief faded.  He  was  the  "happy  warrior" 
whom  a  great  cause  had  long  awaited.  Modest,  serene, 
imperturbable,  cool  in  counsel  and  resolute  in  action, 
he  rose  brilliantly  to  every  occasion  which  presented 
itself — at  Morhange,  at  the  Marne,  in  Flanders,  in 
Artois,   in  the   Victory    Offensive. 

"The  war  was  won  by  faith,"  said  Foch  in  a  state- 
ment issued  in  March,  1919.  So  far  as  he  contributed 
to  win  it — and  his  share  was  greater  than  any  other 
man's — it  was  won  by  a  superb  combination  of  faith 
and  genius. 


INDEX 


Activists,  Belgian,  14 

Aisne,  battle  of,  1914, 142-144; 

1917,330.331 

Albert  of  Belgium,  143 

Alexieff,  174 

Allenby,  21 1,  324 

Allied  Military  Council,  105 

America,  Germany's  challenge 

to,  303-323 
Antwerp,  siege  of,  144,  145 
Aosta,  Duke  of,  354 
Arabic  case,  309,  310 
Ardenne,  239,  400 
Argonne,   battle   of   the,    406, 

407,  408 
Arnim,  329,  388 
Arras,  battle  of,  325-327 
Artois,  battles  of,  228, 229, 232, 

233 
Attrition,  theory  of,  23,  27 
Auffenberg,  34,  35,  166 
Avarescu,  297,  327 
Azan, 235, 236,  238 


B 


Ballin,  letter  to  Rathenau,  63- 

65. 

Baltic   Provinces,   Germaniza- 

tion  of,   16,   17,  317-320 
Belgian  atrocities,  1 1 
Belgian  neutrality,  violation  of, 

10,  49,  50 
Belgium,     Germanization     of, 

10,  15 
Belleau  Wood,  battle  of,  384 
Belloc,  Hilaire,  23 
Below,  355 
Bernhardi,  20,  48,  112 
Bernstorff,  309 
Bc'hmann-Hollweg,  96,  304 
Bismarck,  21-22 


Bissing,  13,  14 

Blockade,  effects  of,  74-76 

Bolo  Pasha,  332 

Boroevic,  361 ,  389 

Bouresches,  battle  of,  384 

Bratiano,  301 

Brest-Litovsk,  209;  Treaty  of, 

319,  32°.  364,  365 
Briand,  332 
Briey,  245,  248,  249 
Brusiloff,  76,  94,  105,  117,  166, 

174,  201,  204,  265,  267,  285, 

286,  290 
Bulgaria,  24,  47,  48 
Bulow,  124,  126,  131,  134.  135 
Byng,  337,  338,  339,  342,  370, 

371 


C 


Cadorna,   348,   351,  353,   354, 

355.  357,  360 
Caillaux,  332 
Call  well,  198 
Cambrai,  battle  of,  240,  334- 

342 

Capello,  354 

Caporetto,  battle  of,  97,  355- 

359 
Carden,  188 
Carey,  374 

Carpathians,  battle  of  the,  173 
Carso,  the,  352~354 
Castelnau,  de,   125,   138,   144, 

253 
Central      Powers,      military 

strength  of,  24,  25 
Champagne,    battle    of,    231, 

232 
Churchill,  Winston,   145,   194, 

197 
Clemenceau,  332 
Constantine  of  Greece,  45-47, 

216,  217,  291,  295,  300 


411 


4H 


Index 


Cost  of  the  war,  80,  81 

Cromer,  197 

Czarina   of   Russia,    46,    283, 

284, 289 
Czernin,  319 


D 


Dankl,  34,  166 

Dardanelles,  41-44,  102,  113- 

115,  176-191 
Dead  Man's  Hill,  256,  257 
D'Amade,  191 
D'Esperey,  134,  135,  211 
Delcass6,  217 
DeRobeck,  188 
Diaz,  360 

Diaz-Retg,  244,  245,  247,  264 
Dimitrieff,  204 
Doyle,  Sir  Conan,  338 
Dubail,  125,  138 
Dubno,  210 
Dunajec,  battle  of   the,  201- 

208,  250,  251 


"Easterners"  and  "Western- 
ers," 106,  107,  116,  194- 
196 

Eichhorn,  17 

Emden,  54 

Entente  Powers,  military 
strength  of,  24,  25 

Enver  Pasha,  182,  187 


Falkenhausen,  14,  15 
Falkenhayn,  93,  200,  203,  208, 

211,  2l8,  220,  241,  242,  244, 
246,  247,  248,  250,  251,  254, 
255,  256,  257,  273,  297,  304, 
398 
Falkland    Islands,    battle    of, 

54 
Farragut,  179 
Ferdinand  of  Bulgaria,  45-48, 

216 
Festubert,  battle  of,  228 
Finland,  Germanization  of,  17, 

317-320 
Fisher,  Lord,  189 
Flanders,  battle  of,  19 14,  139- 

157 


Flanders  campaign,  1917,328- 

330 
Fleming-Walloon  issue  in  Bel- 
gium, 12-15 
Flemish  autonomy,  13,  14 
Flemish  literary  revival,  12,  14 
Foch,  104,  117,  135,  144,  150, 

211,  228,  262,  291,  313,  331, 

374,  382,  383,  384,  385,  386, 
388 

Foch's  Victory  Offensive,  389- 
411 

Franco-Russian  military  com- 
pact, 107-112 

French  Revolution,  4,  6 

French,    Sir   John,    126,    134, 

231 
Freytag-Loringhoven,   29,   67, 
68,  76,  86,  87,  88,  122,  123, 

137.  152,  153,  156,  157.  175. 
176,  212,  213,  340,  341,  408 


Gallipoli,  157,  178-198,  226 

German  colonial  policy,  61-63 

Gibbs,  Philip,  368 

Goeben,  battle-cruiser,  41-43 

Goltz,  181,  186 

Gough,  369,  373 

Gouraud.  392 

Gourko,    164,    206,    207,    282, 

283,  289,  290, 301 
Grand    Duke    Nicholas,    173, 

174,209 
Grant,  410 
Greece,  45,  46 
Grey,  Sir  Edward,  44,  45,  65, 

217 
Grossetti,  150 
Gumbinnen,  battle  of,  no 


H 


Haig,  263,  274,  275,  276,  327, 

335.  367.  37°>  372,  374.  379. 

380,  405 
Hamilton,  Ian,  191,  193 
Hanotaux,  139,  140 
Harden,  Maximilian,  37 
Hausen,  124,  125,  126,  134,  135 
Herr,  253,  254 
Hmdenburg,  32,  ^,  91-93,  95, 

96,  163,  164,  167,  168,  169, 

170,  173,  208,  211,  243,  262, 


Index 


415 


Hindenburg — Continued 

263,  273,  302,  303,  304,  306, 

325. 332 
Hindenburg    Line,    225,    226, 

239,  240,  278-280,  402-407 
Hindenburg's  retreat,  276-280 
Hoetzendorff,    172,    349,    350, 

35i.358,36i 
Hoffmann,  213,  320,  322 
Humbert,  332 
Hutier,    203,    321,    339,    371, 

386,  389,  401 


I 


Italy  in  the  war,  101,  104,  343- 

363 
Ivanoff,  166,  174 


Jagow,  304,  305 

Joffre,  49,  in,  112,  113,  123, 
124,  127,  128,  129,  133,  135, 
137,  138,  139,  140,  143,  146, 
J53.  x56,  171,  221,  222,  264, 
398 

Johnson,  Prof.  D.  W.,  352 

K 

Kaledin,  286,  287 
Kerensky,  315,  318,  319 
Kitchener,  183,  191,  197,  198, 

224 
Kluck,  124,  130,  131,  133,  134, 

135.  137.  14°.  142,221 
Korniloff,  315,  316,  318 
Kovno,  209,  213 
Krasnik,  battle  of,  34,  159 
Kuropatkin,  161,  174,  284,  285 
Kut-el-Amara,  115 


Langle  de  Cary,  125,  126,  129, 

134,  253,  254 
Lanrezac,  124,  126,  134 
Law,  Bonar,  368 
Lee,  226 
Lemberg,  battles  of,  159,  208, 

209 
Lenine,  315,  318,  320,  364 
Lens,  228 
Lesh,  287,  288 


Letchitsky,  286,  288,  316 
Lincoln,  410 

Lissauer,  Hymn  of  Hate,  150 
Lloyd   George,   36,    104,    299, 

359.  368 
Lodz,  battle  of,  168 
Loos,  battle  of,  232,  233 
Lublin,  campaigns  for,  34,  159, 

209, 211 
Ludendorff,  38,  95,  96,  97,  98, 

128,  239,  280,  306,  307,  314, 

317,318,319,  320,  321,  322, 

342,396-411 
Ludendorff's  gamble,  364-388 
Ludendorff 's  offensives,   19 18: 

first,  368-377;  second,  377- 

381;  third,  381-384;  fourth, 

384-387;  fifth,  388-394 
Lusitania  case,  57,  308-310 

M 

Mackensen,  92,  173,  202,  203, 

211,  216,  218,  296,  297,  298, 

299.  302 
Madelin,  120,  121 
Malvy,  332 

Man  power  in  the  war,  24,  27 
Mangin,  258,  385,  392 
Mannerheim,  318 
Marne,  first  battle  of,  49-51, 

85,  86,  87,  88,  89,   119-138; 

second    battle  of,    381-385, 

390^01 
Marwitz,  401 
Maubeuge,  122,  171 
Maunoury,  125,  132,  133,  134 
Maurice,  194,  195,  379 
Max  of  Baden,  407 
Mazurian  Lakes,  battle  of ,  170 
Meade,  226 
Mercier,  14 
Mertens,  187,  188 
Messines  Ridge,  battle  of,  328, 

329 

Mittel-Europa,  creation  of, 
203-220 

Moltke,  the  Elder,  20,  83-87, 
90,  247;  the  Younger,  83-87, 
138,  143,  171,  200,  211,  246, 

247 
Morgenthau,  43,  181,  182,  187, 

188 
Muhlon,  Dr.  Wilhelm,  18,  38, 

87,  163,  164 


416 


Index 


N 


Napoleon  I,  5,  6,317,  322;  mili- 
tary policy  in  Europe,  5-7, 

Napoleonic  Empire,  5,  6 
Neufchateau,  battle  of,  126 
Neuve  Chapelle,  battle  of,  203, 

227,  228,  230 
"  Nibbling, "  Joffre's,  221-240 
Nicholas  II,  210,  282,  283 
Nivelle,  258,  331 
Numbers  in  the  war,  23,  25 


Painleve,  332 

Palat,  140,  141 

Palmer,  408 

Pan-German  delusions,  2,  3 

Pau, 124 

Paulus,  408 

Persius,  73 

Petain,    231,    253,    254,    255, 

33i.  332,333 

Piave,  battle  of,  361 ,  387 

Poland,  Germanization  of,  8, 
15..  16,  317,  320 

Positional  warfare,  develop- 
ment of,  221-240 

Prague,  treaty  of,  9 

Protopopoff,  282,  283,  289, 
300,  302 

Prussia,  Crown  Prince  of,  125, 
134,142,245,332,333 

Prussia,  growth  of,  20,  22 

Przemysl,  158,  167,  168,  172, 
201,  202,  208 


R 


Rawa-Russka,  35,  208,  209 
Rawlinson,  149,  274 
Reinach,  127 
Rennenkampf,  162,  168 
Ribot,  332 
Riga,  battle  of,  316 
Roda-Roda,  31,  205,  283 
Rome  as   an   empire   builder, 

3,4 
Rosso,  358 
Rovno,  210 
Ruffey,  125,  126,  134 


Rumania,  94,  291-301;  treaty 
with  the  Entente,  294,  295 

Rupprecht  of  Bavaria,  144, 
15? 

Russia,  early  successes,  158- 
177;    collapse    of,    281-291, 

314-323 
Russian   military   deficiencies, 

29-31 
Russian  Revolution,  96,  314- 

320 
Russky,  166,  174,  208 


Sakharov,  286,  297 
Salonica,  244,  246 
Samsonoff,  163,  164 
Sarrail,  134,  218,  246,  265,  291, 

295,  296,  300 
Scheidemann,  366 
Scherbatchev,  286,  287,  288 
Schiller,  Ring  of  Polykrates,  40, 

4i,  59 
Schleswig-Holstein,  8,  9,  137 
Schlieffen,  84,  87-89,  127,  131, 

136,  137,  138,  211 
Schreiner,  187,  188 
Scott,  Admiral  Sir  Percy,  55 
Sea  power  in  the  war,  60-79 
Serbia,  45,  47 
Sherman,  410 
Somme,  battle  of,  261-276 
St.  Gond,  marshes  of,  121 
St.  Mihiel,  142 
vSt.  Quentin,   battle    of,    368- 

377 

Stegemann,  122,  136 

Strategy,  development  of  Al- 
lied, 100-118;  development 
of  German,  80-99 

Sturmer,  46,  282,  283,  289, 
300,  302 

Sussex  note,  304,  305,  310, 


Talaat  Pasha,  182 
Tannenberg,  battle  of,  91,  no, 

163-165 
Tigris  expedition,  115,  116 
Tirpitz,  38,  69-73,  303 


Index 


417 


Trench    warfare,    51-53,    112, 

113,233-240 
Trotzky, 315, 318, 320, 364 
Turkey,  entry  into  the  war,  91 


U 


U-boat,  54-58,  77,  78 
Ukraine,     Germanization     of, 

16-17,   3I7~320 
United  States,  relations  with 

Germany,  57,  58,  303-323 


V 


Venizelos,  45,  47,  217 
Verdun,  battle  of,  93,  220,  224, 
241-260 


W 

Wangenheim,  180,  181,  182 
Weddigen,  148 

William  II,  37,  60,  61,  322,  351 
Wurttemberg,  Grand  Duke  of, 
125,  134,  142 


Ypres,  first  battle  of,  151 ;  sec- 
ond battle  of ,  22 1 ,  222 
Yser,  battle  of  the,  150,  151 


Zabern  incident,  7 


The  World  War 

And  Its  Consequences 

By 

William  Herbert  Hobbs 

With  an  Introduction  by 

Theodore  Roosevelt 


Theodore  Roosevelt  said,  after  a 
careful  reading  of  the  Manuscript:  "It 
is  the  literal  truth,  that  if  I  could  choose 
only  one  book  to  be  put  in  the  hand  of 
every  man  and  woman  in  the  United 
States,  I  would  choose  the  book  of 
Professor  Hobbs." 


G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  London 


The  Chaos  in  Europe 

By 

Frederick  Moore 

Author  of  "  The  Balkan  Trail,"  "  The  Passing  of  Morocco,"  «tc. 
With  an  Introduction  by 

Charles  W.  Eliot,  LL.D. 

President  Emeritus,  Harvard  University 


A  Consideration  of  the  Political  De- 
struction that  has  taken  place  in  Russia 
and  Elsewhere  and  of  the  International 
Policies  of  America. 

The  author  has  had  a  rare  experience 
as  a  correspondent,  qualifying  him  to 
a  remarkable  degree  to  describe  the 
present  military  and  political  situation. 
His  suggestions  referring  to  the  future 
foreign  policy  of  the  United  States 
merit  the  careful  attention  of  leaders 
of  opinion. 


G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  London 


The  Evidence  in 
the  Case 

A  Discussion  of  the  Moral  Responsibility  for  the  War  of 

1914,  as  Disclosed  by  the  Diplomatic  Records 

of   England,  Germany,   Russia,  France 

Austria,  and  Belgium 

By 
JAMES  M.  BECK,  LL.D. 

Late  Assistant  Attorney-General  of  the  U.  S. 
With  an  Introduction  by 

The  Hon.  JOSEPH  H.  CHOATE 

Late  U.  S.  Ambassador  to  Great  Britain 

1 5  th  Printing — Revised  Edition  with  much  Additional 
Material 

"  Mr.  Beck's  book  is  so  extremely  interesting 
from  beginning  to  end  that  it  is  difficult  when 
once  begun  to  lay  it  down  and  break  off  the 
reading,  and  we  are  not  surprised  to  hear  not 
only  that  it  has  had  an  immense  sale  in  England 
and  America,  but  that  its  translation  into  the 
languages  of  the  other  nations  of  Europe  has 
been  demanded." — Hon.  Joseph  H.  Choate  in 
The  New  York  Times. 

New  York        G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons  London 


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